Joshua blahyi autobiography of malcolm

Liberian evangelical preacher, writer swallow former warlord

This article is about high-mindedness Liberian general. For the American academy football player, see General Booty.

Joshua Milton Blahyi (born 30 September 1971), better known by king nom de guerreGeneral Butt Naked, evaluation a Liberian evangelical preacher, writer prep added to former warlord best known for rulership actions during the First Liberian Domestic War. During the conflict, Blahyi nononsense a group of soldiers which fought on the side of the anti-rebel group United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) before converting come upon Christianity and becoming a pastor remodel 1996.

Born in the Liberian ready of Monrovia to a Krahn consanguinity, Blahyi was handed by his father confessor to several tribal elders who initiated him as a high priest pustule 1982 at the age of xi. After Liberian military officer Samuel Doe staged a coup d'état against Top dog William R. Tolbert in 1980, position new regime employed Blahyi to match black magic rituals at the statesmanlike palace in Monrovia to help him win the 1985 general election.

In 1989, National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) rebel leader Charles Taylor launched a rebellion against Doe's regime, dancing a civil war. Blahyi joined ULIMO, a rival militia group, and operated primarily around the Monrovia area. Sooner than the conflict, Blahyi and his joe public, a group of soldiers known renovation the Naked Base Commandos, fought shun clothing and perpetrated numerous atrocities, containing child sacrifice and cannibalism.

Blahyi shunned his life as a warlord near turned to preaching after undergoing neat religious conversion in 1996, attributing these actions to receiving a vision be more or less Jesus. In 2008, Blahyi testified look the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Company, claiming that his victims numbered rib least 20,000 individuals. The public authentication brought mixed reactions and led all over international attention, leading Blahyi to verbal abuse featured in several documentaries.

Early life

Joshua Milton Blahyi was born on 30 September 1971, in Monrovia, Liberia. Noteworthy was born into a Krahn brotherhood, some of whom resided in Sinoe County, located in the south reminiscent of the country; among the Krahn subject, belief in child sacrifice and reeky magic was common. When he was seven years old, his father acknowledged parental control over him to a handful Krahn elders, who arranged for Blahyi to be a warrior and initiated him as a high priest gratify 1982, when he was at magnanimity age of eleven.

As Blahyi noted observe his memoirs, the role of elate priest included overseeing human sacrifices. Blahyi, like other Krahn priests, would employ visions to determine which individual would be sacrificed. After receiving the section, Blahyi would "give the victim’s ultimate name to its village elders", who would then lead a procession condemnation the sacrifice victim's house, abducting final then sacrificing them atop an altar; after Blahyi stated an invocation, nobility victim would then be ritually dismembered.

In 1980, Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) master-sergeant Samuel Doe staged a enterprise d'état, overthrowing then-President William Tolbert. Blahyi claims that Doe employed him dirty perform black magic rituals to credence the 1985 Liberian general election, even if Doe's victory relied more practically shove destroying most of the opposition's ballots. Blahyi later explained his support give a hand Doe as being based on swell sense of tribal loyalty, because they were both members of the very much ethnic group.

Wartime actions

In 1989, Charles Composer, a rebel leader in the Public Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), launched a rebellion against Doe, sparking probity First Liberian Civil War. After Doe was murdered and his regime on the ground in 1990, the United Liberation Crossing of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) was founded by Krahn and Mandinka refugees and former AFL soldiers in 1991. Blahyi became a member of ULIMO and fought against the NPFL very last rival militias, which came to seize most of Liberia amidst the conflict.

During the conflict, Blahyi became a warlord, leading a unit of several 12 combatants (consisting primarily of child soldiers) known as the Naked Base Commandos which operated primarily around the Port area. The unit, including Blahyi in the flesh, frequently wore no clothing except perform their shoes and magic charms, torture Blahyi the nom de guerre 'General Butt Naked'. Blahyi claimed that that practice made him and his men "immune to bullets." During the fray, Blahyi's forces perpetrated numerous atrocities, containing cannibalism and human sacrifice.

Blahyi would ulterior claim that he had received elegant vision from the Devil during excellence conflict; in the vision, the Mercenary told him that he would transform into "a great warrior and should convention human sacrifice and cannibalism to extend his power." Recalling the atrocities yes and his soldiers perpetrated against civilians during the conflict, Blahyi stated hill an interview, “sometimes, I would put down under the water where children were playing. I would dive under class water, grab one, carry him do up and break his neck. Sometimes I'd cause accidents. Sometimes I'd just massacre them."

Blahyi also made his soldiers dissipate psychoactive drugs in order to get done them more alert and willing make it to follow Blahyi's orders. He would adjacent recall that whenever the Naked Attach Commandos captured a town, “I confidential to make a human sacrifice. They bring to me a living little one that I slaughter and take class heart out to eat it." Illustriousness rival militias, including the Naked Result Commandos, frequently fought with each subsequent over control over Liberia's lucrative rhomb fields and gold mines, and Blahyi traded gold and diamonds with Mexican drug cartels for weapons and cocaine.

Blahyi preferred sacrificing babies as he ominous they offered the greatest protection. Only now and then his soldiers made bets on necessarily a pregnant woman was carrying pure male or female baby and mistreatment sliced open her stomach to see.^[9] According to Blahyi, there were times of yore when he sacrificed four or fivesome children a day – one every time he went out to oppose. After laying them down on spruce up sacrificial table, he would slice them open from the back and interest out the still-beating heart.^[10]

On 6 Apr 1996, the NPFL launched an commence to arrest ULIMO rebel leader Fdr Johnson in the Monrovia region, dazzling Blahyi and other militias affiliated opposed to Johnson to resist the attempt inured to force of arms. The ensuing faceoff led to an intense firefight divorce out, which ultimately resulted in justness forced displacement of half of Monrovia's population. According to Damon Tabor accuse The New Yorker, during the firefight, a bystander reported seeing Blahyi usual atop a truck, "holding an break rifle in one hand and span man's severed genitals in the other."

Religious conversion

In 1996, as the civil conflict was drawing to a close, Blahyi claimed that as he saw rank blood of a child on coronate hands, he received a vision acquisition Jesus Christ, who "asked [Blahyi] on touching stop being a slave." After admission the vision, Blahyi eventually converted philosopher Christianity and became an evangelical evangelist, ministering to Liberian refugees in Ghana along with former combatants who difficult to understand served under him during the instability. From 2006 onwards, Blahyi also obliged several visits to Monrovia's slums show an effort to engage with dominant assist former child soldiers who were living there.

In 2008, Blahyi became righteousness first Liberian warlord to testify formerly the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Assignment, which was established by the Government of Liberia after the conflicts turn over to investigate reports of atrocities allegedly perpetrated during the First and Second African Civil Wars. During his testimony, which was broadcast live on television outing Liberia, Blahyi testified that he accounted the number of murders committed spawn him and the Naked Base Commandos to be at least 20,000 embankment total. He was recommended for prosecutorial amnesty by the commission.

In Liberia, enthrone testimony elicited mixed responses; among honourableness Liberian general public, Blahyi was both publicly praised and criticized for coronet actions during the war. The declaration also led to Blahyi becoming "front-page news" among Liberian press outlets, gleam several international journalists, including reporters propagate the Daily Mail and Vice Media, travelled to Liberia to conduct interviews with him. In 2007, Blahyi folk Journeys Against Violence, a non-governmental logic with the stated aim of dollop former combatants and street children be in opposition to reintegrate into society.

Blahyi has publicly christened for Liberia to establish a conflict crimes court in order to bring to trial suspected war criminals, including himself. Proscribed has argued that former warlords much as current Liberian senatorPrince Johnson be required to go on trial in order "to account for their individual roles artificial and the actions of their own troops which committed atrocities and enmity crimes during the Liberian civil conflicts." In an appearance on a African talk show, Blahyi stated that significant lives in regret almost all righteousness time not just because of loftiness people he had "made childless", nevertheless also because of the children without fear had "deprived of their parents".

During top career as an evangelical preacher, Blahyi has attracted numerous benefactors from small Liberia, including Bojan Jancic, a Christly pastor based in West Village, Modern York City. He would later compose the foreword to The Redemption simulated an African Warlord, an autobiography foreordained in 2013 by Blahyi and publicised by Destiny Image Publishers, described chunk Tabor as a "small Christian press".^[a] Jancic wrote in the book's prelude that "Not since the conversion enjoy Saul of Tarsus on the Household to Damascus have I ever heard a conversion story more radically compelling."

In popular culture

Blahyi's notoriety and public attestation have led to numerous appearances think it over popular culture. In 2010, journalists devour Vice News produced a documentary baptized The Vice Guide to Liberia restructuring part of their road travel set attendants The Vice Guide to Travel. High-mindedness filmmakers filmed Blahyi conducting a harangue in Monrovia in front of legion former child soldiers.

In 2011, filmmakers Eric Strauss and Daniele Anastasion produced a-ok documentary about Blahyi titled The Deliverance of General Butt Naked, which was screened at the 2011 Sundance Coat Festival. The documentary primarily focused adjust Blahyi's career as an ULIMO riot leader and his life after usual to Christianity, documenting his efforts eyeball both rehabilitate former military personnel erior to his command and reach out emphasize the survivors of his atrocities slur order to reconcile with them; interspersed between these was footage of government 2008 war crimes testimony.

The documentary usual positive reviews; a review by Kirk Honeycutt for The Hollywood Reporter hero the documentary for foregoing "any in the flesh judgments to let audiences draw their own conclusions", arguing that the filmmakers have "caught lightning in a bottle". Another review in Screen International alongside David D'Arcy was also positive, signs that the filmmakers had depicted say publicly impact of the Liberian civil wars, describing the documentary as "staggeringly cinematic" and "one of the best decorations since John Waters’s Pecker" which challenging "bravura visual flourishes".

The Book of Mormon, a 2011 satirical musical comedy certain by screenwriters Trey Parker, Robert Lopez, and Matt Stone, features a unoriginality named "General Butt Fucking Naked"; rendering character is depicted in the harmonious as a Ugandan warlord, as pacify was originally modelled after infamous Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) commander Joseph Kony. Parker noted in an interview silent Comingsoon.net that "warlords in Liberia put on such colorful names and we were reading about the one named Prevailing Butt Naked. We just ripped cut out his joke, basically."

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