Former Foreign Minister Dee-Maxwell Saah Kemayah has been sentenced to ten years in prison in the case of Saudi-donated rice diverted from the Liberians it was meant to feed.

Criminal Court "C" in Monrovia passed sentence on Friday, November 13, after Judge Ousman Feika refused the defence's request for a new trial and moved straight to sentencing at the Temple of Justice.

Kemayah and some of his co-defendants received ten-year terms. Other convicted defendants were sentenced to five years. The defence announced immediately that it would challenge the outcome before the Supreme Court of Liberia.

The case centred on rice donated in April 2023 by the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center of Saudi Arabia — 29,412 bags of 25-kilogram rice, a consignment reported at about US$500,000, intended for disaster victims and vulnerable communities across the country. Prosecutors said more than 25,000 bags were diverted, misused and stolen.

Kemayah, who also served as Liberia's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, was convicted on charges including theft of property, economic sabotage, misuse of public office, criminal conspiracy and misapplication of entrusted property.

A jury had found eight defendants guilty on October 9, after a trial of about forty days. Three others were acquitted, and the jury could not reach a verdict on two more.

The appeal now goes to the Supreme Court, which will be asked to review the trial, the jury's findings, the refusal of a new trial and the sentences themselves. An appeal does not by itself overturn a conviction — the sentences stand unless the court decides otherwise.

For a country where rice is more than food — it is history, politics and daily survival — the case has never been only about bags in a warehouse. It is about whether donated relief reaches the people it was sent for, and what happens to senior officials when it does not.

What to watch next: the Supreme Court appeal, and whether the court sets a date to hear it.