Page 36 - Time Magazine-November 05, 2018

World

especially for the 10 months of the year planning stages, Meyler arrived in Mon- to be the accelerator, though it offers
that Meyler’s Facebook posts showed she rovia with a suitcase full of medical sup- no guarantee of results. Brass points to
was raising money in the U.S. plies, and chronicled it all on Instagram, the Kony 2012 video about the Ugandan
But the most obvious explanation for Facebook and Twitter. warlord that racked up 100 million views
the scandal drawing so little attention was Meyler’s school project had taken off on YouTube in the space of six days, in
yet another coincidence of timing. Dur- when she won $1 million by collecting the the name of raising awareness about his
ing that the same week that the Oracle of most votes on Facebook to win the 2012 crimes. Six years later, Joseph Kony re-
Omaha dropped to his knee and Johnson American Giving Awards sponsored by mains at large, and his militia continues
was taken into custody, a third event oc- JPMorgan Chase. She had written on her to kidnap children.
curred: Ebola erupted in Monrovia. forehead the name of a Liberian girl she Nor are well-established organizations
The epidemic not only overshadowed described as selling herself to buy drink- immune to abuse. The head of Oxfam,
all other news from West Africa for the re- ing water. “I am Abigail” went viral. the British charity that has over 10,000
mainder of the calendar year, it also made With the money, Meyler went from of- workers in more than 90 countries, an-
Meyler more famous than ever, and in a fering scholarships to existing schools to nounced he would step down in May after
new context. The epicenter of the Ebola starting one of her own: the More Than its workers in Haiti were accused of ex-
catastrophe in Liberia’s capital was West Me academy opened in 2013 on Meyler’s ploiting victims of the 2010 earthquake.
Point, and Meyler threw herself and the birthday—aptly enough, for an enter- “I don’t think this is necessarily an Afri-
charity into saving lives there. Over the prise that looked like an institution, but can story,” says Brass. “Anywhere where
course of the outbreak, Liberians on More in crucial ways remained a personal proj- you have massive power differentials, you
Than Me’s payroll transported, at substan- ect. Young’s reporting detailed the risks have the opportunity for abuse.”
tial personal risk to their own health, 262 entailed in that informality: funds unac- When something terrible does emerge,
suspected Ebola patients to treatment and counted for, a principal hired with no ad- crisis-management experts advise a strat-
visited almost 3,000 homes to check on ministrative experience and a board of di- egy of radical candor: assess the damage,
residents’ welfare, by the charity’s count. rectors on which no one “had experience publicize the results, vow to do better. But
Meyler was in the middle of it, often running schools or safeguarding vulner- when Johnson was charged, More Than
with visiting journalists in tow. A flurry able children.” Borghese was an Italian Me went another way entirely. The char-
of international attention followed, prince who marketed cosmetics on the ity hired a public-relations expert who
and in December, Meyler was included Home Shopping Network. His wife, Katie had worked for Mitt Romney and Con-
among the individuals TIME named its Borghese, was a close friend of Meyler’s doleezza Rice. A press release was posted
2014 Person of the Year for their coura- and also on the board. on its website mentioning “numerous stu-
geous fight against the epidemic. More “Peace Corps volunteers, people who dents reported sexual misconduct” by
Than Me’s budget for the next fiscal year have done one-mission trips somewhere, a “community liaison.” The statement
more than tripled. they’re constantly starting organizations noted “the country’s epidemic of child
“I won’t get sick,” she wrote in a mes- like this,” says Jennifer N. Brass, an asso- rape” and Meyler was quoted diffusing
sage to her sister during the epidemic that ciate professor at Indiana University who responsibility: “Our girls cannot be vic-
was reported by Young. “If I did, though, it studies international aid agencies. “The timized a second time by a culture that
would be worth it. No one else here is doing fact thatthat onetook off is extremely rare.” accepts their rape as standard practice.”
this. Showing love n dignity in death.” When it happens, social media tends Blog posts featuring Johnson were de-
leted, as was the reference to Meyler and
InternatIonal aId organIzatIons Johnson as “founders.” Also scrubbed was
working in poor countries do lots of Johnson’s role in recruiting girls.
important and admirable work, but at After the report, Meyler agreed to But the charity’s name remained
ground level their efforts are often ob- take a leave of absence from the daubed in paint on Johnson’s house, in-
charity she founded
scured by their structures: the offices, ▽ side of which several girls said they were
the walled compounds, the lumbering instructed to wait, looking at pornography
white SUVs. Their bulky bureaucracies on his phone before being raped.
are partly to accommodate the foreign- Formal background checks may not al-
ers whorotatethroughon short-term con- ways be practical on the ground in sub-
tracts, but also to enforce standards put Saharan Africa, but Young found indica-
in place to protect both the organizations tions that Johnson would not have passed
and the people they aim to help. one. The mother of his children said she
They are not Mother Teresa in what had caught him molesting girls several
was once Calcutta, or Albert Schweitzer times, and said she left him after he im- MONROVIA: AHMED JALL ANZO — EPA - EFE/SHUT TERSTOCK MEYLER: IMEH AKPANUDOSEN — PT TOW/GET T Y IMAGES;
in what is now Gabon. There’s something pregnated a 14-year-old in their care.
compelling about one person trying to She said she was less direct when Mey-
make a difference—especially in the age ler asked about Johnson, in a conversa-
of social media. After the Ebola outbreak, tion in 2011, the year Meyler and Johnson
when major aid agencies were still in the wereintimate.Describing theexchange to
66 Time November 5, 2018