Courtesy of Nat Nyuan Bayjay, Staff Reporter of FrontPageAfrica

With less than three weeks at its new location, FrontPageAfrica, an online news magazine in Liberia, came under attack from unknown men who attempted to set the newspaper’s entire publishing facility ablaze. The arson attempt failed.

The attempted attack took place early Monday morning (about 3 AM) when two unknown men went to the giant news organization’s newly constructed Oldest Congo Town facilities and began to immediately set fire to the compound. FrontPageAfrica recently relocated from its former Camp Johnson office in Central Monrovia to its newly constructed complex in Oldest Congo Town, Sinkor, in order to be able to accommodate the expansion of the entity’s scope of operations.

According to an eyewitness who was in the premises when the incident occurred, the men tied a long piece of cloth to a plastic-bag inside of which was gas. They then lit the cloth on fire and threw the bag over the roof.

“They started striking matches sticks on that piece of cloth”, said Arthur Maseh, one of the security men who was on duty Monday night.

“Then I heard the sound and looked outside. I saw two men, one huge man and another fellow. When I shouted ‘Who there?’ they never moved. But when I started following behind them, they started running”, Maseh continued.

According to eyewitnesses who themselves are employees of the entity, the incident occurred immediately following the heavy downpour of rain Monday morning.

The attempted attack on the news organ came after the entity had just produced its first two print versions, as it undergoes its transitional period from online to print. The first appearance of the FrontPage Newspaper on the Liberian newsstands caused a stir among the public, who believe the paper will add more value to the competitive Liberian media landscape.

Meanwhile, two officers from the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Liberian National Police (LNP) and the United Nations Police visited the scene of the attempted arson during which time a preliminary investigation was conducted. It remains unclear who are the master-minds of such an evil plan.