text: New Liberia Council chief to be installed Tuesday . MONROVIA 1996-08-28 Ruth Perry , the woman with the task of uniting Liberia 's squabbling factions around the latest peace plan , will be formally installed as head of the ruling State Council next Tuesday , a Council statement said . Perry , a Liberian Senate member during the 1980s , returned to Monrovia on August 22 after West African leaders nominated her for the job under a peace deal signed in Nigeria 's capital Abuja five days earlier . The formal inauguration had been due to take place this week but was put back . There was no official explanation but politicians said faction leaders and State Council vice-chairmen Charles Taylor and Alhadji Kromah were unable to attend because they were travelling . Liberia 's civil war , launched by Taylor in 1989 , has killed well over 150,000 people . Faction fighting and an orgy of looting in the capital Monrovia in April and May killed hundreds of people . Over a dozen peace deals have collapsed . The latest sets a timetable for disarmament by the end of January and elections by May 30 . West African leaders have threatened individual sanctions against faction leaders to ensure compliance . Freed American slaves founded Liberia in 1847 .