Liberia’s Electoral History
Towards 2023 Process
- The Need to Inhibit Fraudulent Election
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By Bill K Jarkloh
EMAIL: billkjarkloh@gmail.com
CALL: +231(0)776347099
Recent
events on our way towards the 2023 election are obviously indicative of an
attempt 2023 process may take the country back to Egypt unless we discover our
past as a nation and people. The beginning of electoral irregularities in the
first democracy in Africa, the Republic of Liberia, is traced as
far back as to the early 1920s which was handed down to the 1980s and 1997. For
each time we misbehaved during elections, we suffered consequences.
Election rigging in the history of Liberia’s democracy was first recorded, if
it had ever been at any other time in history, into
the Guinness Book of Records as a result of the fraud that had attended the
1927 democratic process. The 1927 contest between President King and his
contender, Standard-bearer Faulkner of the People’s Party, was recorded as the
most fraudulent election ever in the Guinness
Book of Records. (Akwei,
July 10, 2017 ) Years after, Liberia recorded yet another infamous
election on pages of African history books and outstanding publications of the
world in 1985 and a third in 1997. In any case, it is obvious that poor
democratic records of vote rigging have recorded ineffable negative consequences
to the country. The repercussions attending the aftermath of these fraudulent
elections usually resulted in actions by affected opponents. Therefore
Considering that a free, fair and transparent 2022 process a panacea for
sustainable peace and democracy in the country as opposed to the political
turbulence experienced in the past, and judging from the trend of
pre-election discussions and agitations over suspicions of an ensuing
fraudulent elections in the face of a politically factionalized media setting,
this article intends to remind the Liberian political actors, the people and
the media of the devastating consequences fraudulent elections had had on our
country and the body polity of Liberia.
My concern is a result of what had happened in recent times which are
reminiscent of a situation which resulted in a full scale civil war in the
aftermath of the 1985 b democratic process. It started when a pro-ANC “WE ARE
TIRED” Rally was held when ANC politicians were critical of the CDC Government
of President George Weah. Why we will discuss some of the
criticisms by Cummings are not new, but are prevalently indicated across the
opposition bloc in speeches, the President’s robust reaction that went low to
insulting while at the Dominion Church indicates intolerance, especially when
he state that he will deal with opposition people that will protest without
permission (a paraphrase).
The President, returning from a more than 40-day trip, could not have responded
so poorly had rested and critically reviewed Mr. Cummings statement before his
reaction. While I am not a Cummings supporter, I am concerned because we
witnessed a similar display of intolerance by President Samuel K. Doe to the
positions of his critics and the severity he dealt with issues which resulted
in a rigged election and the subsequent fleeing from the country. Do we
want to travel a similar path during the 2023 process, I don’t think so.
It is notwithstanding more concerning when some diaspora Liberians decisively
responded that they are ready to counter any action that the President would
want to render to the opposition groupings. Well these exchanges are not within
the spirit of a peaceful election Liberians would anticipate considering the
history of the electoral system of the country as far back as in the 1920s.
Overview
of the Liberia Electoral System
In every country however, issues bordering on the conduct of elections have
precipitated the kind of electoral system that is practiced in a given society.
For instance in Liberia, the electoral system used here is a majoritarian
system, whereby the candidate who has the highest number of votes is declared
winner of an electoral contest, especially for those who contest for
legislative seats in their constituencies. However, mmajoritarian voting for the presidency is achieved in a single election
using the main form of the majoritarian system which is the two-round system -
the most common system used for presidential elections around the world.
This system, research has proven, is being used in 88 countries for
presidential elections and 20 countries are said to be using it to determine
winners of seats for constituencies represented in their legislatures. For this
system, a second round is held to determine the winner in the case if no
candidate achieves a majority of votes in the first round of voting. Under the
Liberian electoral system, 50 plus one vote is required for a
presidential.
For the presidential election in Liberia, a
candidate is automatically declared a winner of the process if he or she
achieves the threshold of 50+1votes as a winner, if there should not be a
second round of voting in the process. Should there be a second round of
voting, the contest is to involve the two candidates that received the highest
votes in a bid to determine who should win the 50+1 vote win. Cognizant of this
system, opposition parties have stepped up efforts against the ruling party,
the Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) to ensure that there shouldn’t be a
second round chance for that incumbent, President George Manner Weah, who
aspires to a second term of six years.
To say the least, Liberian political actors provided for the majoritarian
system constitutionally because the people believed that it is the system that
is appropriate for our political system. There are other systems practiced
elsewhere that could have been chosen. For instance, the proportional
representation or the PR system whereby subgroups of an electorate including
states, regions, or political parties etc. are reflected proportionately in the
elected body is one of the systems. Others include the mixed-member
majoritarian representation or the MMM system combining majoritarian and
proportional method; the mixed-member proportional representation MMP or MMPR
system – a system in which votes cast are considered in local elections and are
also meant to determine the overall vote tallies which are used to
allocate additional members to produce the overall proportional representation;
and the semi-proportional representation (non-mixed) system which
characterizes multi winner electoral system allowing representation of the
minorities with intent to reflect the strength of the competing political
forces in close proportion to the votes they receive, amongst others.
The Road towards 2023
As stated earlier, the road to 2023
seems rocky and frightening. The election history of the country suggests that
where there are disputes over election results, the country has suffered
instability. Some 30 years or more along the road the aftermath of fraudulent
elections have caused the country and its people much devastation. It can
be recalled that a fraudulent election of 1985 caused the country civil crises
that cause massacre and amputation of peaceful and innocent citizens and the
destruction of millions of properties including vital national infrastructure.
The road to 2023 is indeed rocky, the
billows of confusion has stared roaring ahead of the anticipated electoral
process. It all started with the missing 16 billion Liberian dollars that
caused a lot of protestations; the misappropriated US$25 million given to
Finance and Development Planning Minister Samuel Tweah for mopping up excess
liquidity of local currency on the money market, the June 7 Protest
masterminded by political commentator Henry Pedro Costa, fix our country
protest and the irking economic crises embracing high cost of living
coupled with insecurity that plagued the country are all trending issues
that plague the country. Besides the failure by the government to establish the
war and economic crime court especially at a time corruption is sky-rocketing
and former rebels generals have come public to defend the CDC government is a
serious minus from the integrity and sincerity of the Weah administration which
is also a yardstick by the opposition to measurement the defeat of President
Weah’s bid for a second term.
Additionally, the ruling CDC has
tampered with and weaken the effectiveness of graft institutions such as the
Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission (LACC) and the Governance Commission and the
General Auditing Commission, and somehow effectively curbed their efficiencies
by appointing into them weaklings and unprofessional for the purpose of
controlling their operations.
Accordingly, the country is saturated with
mixed feelings across the country against the system and the governance
process. There has been a number of instances of people going missing and
others of mysterious deaths permeating the country, the dreadfulness of
Monrovia at nights are amongst other scaring circumstances defining the joining
to 20233 while the delay of the already cut salaries of civil servants are a
chunk of the criticisms beclouding the Liberian bureaucracy towards the ensuing
process. Recently, the president was accused of always using the
church pulpit to criticize and threaten opposition, castigate and
mudsling opposition figures, the latest being his response to the “WE ARE TIRE”
political rally organized by the followers of Alexander Cummings at the Dominion
Church of Bishop Isaac Winker.
All of these excesses culminated
in efforts at opposition amalgamation under the Collaboration of four Political
Parties (CPP) amidst outcries of rampant corruption in government, irking
national economic conditions characterizing high prices, acute insecurity and
other negative vices attending the governance system. The critical opposition
greeted these trending situations in the society with a number of protestations
and other forms of expressing their misgivings as stated supra. Accordingly
four of the opposition parties, namely the Unity Party (UP) of former Vice
President Joseph N. Boakai, the Liberty Party (LP) Grand Bassa County Senator
and political Nyonblee Karnga Lawrence, the All-Liberia Party (ALP) of Businessman
Wilfred Benoni Urey and the Alternative National Congress (ANC) of
Alexander Cummings decided to collaborate and formed the Collaboration of
Political Parties to forge the singular Agenda of removing
President Weah of the CDC coalition from power at the first round of voting
during the ensuing presidential 2023 election.
But it was no sooner
than later when crises beset the CPP resulting from who should be the candidate
to go against the incumbent, the candidate for the coalition for democratic
Change, a conglomeration of three political parties with incumbent President
Weah seeking his second term. In the opposition the UP, LP and ALP had
jointly persuaded Mr. Cummings of the ANC to be a Vice Standard-bearer to the
Unity Party’s Joseph Boakai, but Cummings rejected, saying he did not join the
CPP for vice to be a member of the CPP. Cummings insisted on a congress to
select the standard-bearer for the collaboration. It was speculated that
Cummings intended to buy delegates, a reason why the other parties insisted
thereby breaking down the CPP as it was earlier constituted.
In the midst of these the
Liberian media is divided, there are some media outlets who have been defending
the government and the ruling party, projecting that the government has worked
more than any government ever. The pro-government media pointed to the
building of road infrastructure, the investment into Liberian medical doctors
sent away to study to boost the health system, free tuition offered University
students, payment of West African Exams fees for secondary school students, the
14 Military Hospital and the restoration of electricity to Monrovia amongst
others are some of the success the pro-government media ascribed to President
Weah when they contend that the government has worked more than any government
ever, which in essence is farfetched. However, President Weah himself is
confident that he will defeat the opposition at the polls, saying that the
Liberian people themselves have believed in him and noted his exploits as a
development oriented President, who had worked more than his
predecessors. The president and his CDC argued that the CDC that is
able to manage its collaboration is definitely unable to handle the affairs of
state, a reason that reinforces and militates his confidence of winning the
2023 process.
These exchanges are reminiscent of those that attended previous elections in
1985 and subsequently in 1997 before and after the Liberian civil wars.
Important amongst the exchanges is the suspicion the President has kept Madam
Davidetta Brown Lansannah despite the criminal charges hanging over
her. Opposition believed that Madam Lansannah is kept at the helm of the
National Elections Commission for blackmail, since she could be called to
court for prosecution if she does not dance to the beat of the drum of the
ruling party during this electioneering period. With these, the question
is, will we avoid the past or will we allow the country to slide back into a
post-election catastrophe such as the situation after the 1985 elections?
The
1985 Elections
The 1985 elections that brought President Samuel K. Doe to democratic leaders
produced a devastating outcome for the country and its people, although the
I985 elections, the first ever for the second republic after the popular 1980
coup that ousted the True Whig Party regime headed by President William Richard
William Tolbert as a turning point for the Liberians as a people. Its chaotic
and violent aftermath was due to the fact that the process, like it is during
the anticipated 2023 presidential and legislative elections, marked by
suspicions speculations, uncertainties and generally insecurity amongst key
political institutions, actor and their followers, including the National
Democratic Party of Liberia (NDPL) which was obviously the incumbent party.
This above suggests an imperative that the road to 2023 should remain peaceful
so that Liberians will not slide back into the ditch of horror, despair and
mayhem.
With the path trodden by politicians at the time, the presidential contest got
underway involving the three opposition political parties and the National
Democratic Party and Liberians finally went to the polls amidst the gloomy
process to elect Liberia’s first president of the Second Republic and members
of the bi-cameral legislature following a brief but vigorous electoral
campaign.
The process itself was enthusiastic as the general hope was to use the ballot
to send the soldiers back to the barracks so as to enthrone a democratic system
to mark the actual change for which the April 14, 1980 Coup was necessarily
embraced by the people. However, the hope of the people were dashed against
their past isolation in the country’s 138 years of existence by the few elite
Americo-Liberians, the free American slaves who eventually settled here – in
this Grain Coast of Africa and established an oligarchy which deprived the
people their universal franchise of through a multi-party party alliance of the
electorates to truly participate in the determination of the national
leadership as citizens.
This does not mean that there were never genuine presidential contest in the
past few centuries that precedes the 1985 process, the electorates of the
pre-1985 elections were restricted to the so-called the Americo-Liberian ethnic
grouping mainly comprising of the repatriated freed slaves that settled on the
Grain coast, now the Republic of Liberia, who were of course unrepresentative
of the broad-base masses of the people of the country.
Notwithstanding, when voting rights were extended to the people, mainly
the indigenous during the pre-1980 Coup era, their entire participation in
national electoral exercise was comical, ludicrous, preposterous and
farcical as places outside the Capital City otherwise referred to as “interior”
or “provinces” were not actually considered. The national leadership was
decided on Capitol Hill with no input from the masses of the people; the
preferred candidates of the majority of the elite Americo-Liberians were always
declared the winner. In fact an opposition often put up by the ruling party was
to produce an impression of a contest. A classic example was the
Barclay-Faulkner contest with the official candidate of the ruling party
capturing 99.5 percent of the vote against a token opposition. Oh yes! The 1927
general elections in Liberia made history as the most fraudulent election ever
held. With only about 15,000 registered voters, the incumbent Charles D. B.
King garnered 243,000 votes against Thomas J. Faulkner who won 9,000 votes.
This event made it into the Guinness Book of Records as the most fraudulent
election ever. (Akwei,
July 10, 2017). But results of the Barclay-Faulkner elections, like it
did with the aftermath of the 1985 elections, led Liberia into crises as the
result of the dissatisfaction that ensued when Liberia was accused of
practicing forced labor and slavery.
58 years after that a chaotic 1927 democratic
process was the i985 elections which also caused Liberia a national debacle
that provoked international intervention. In his Book:
LIBERIA - The Road to Democracy, Willie A. Givens wrote, that the
elections exposed cynics and regime critics who had predicted that the General
Doe, the head of state and supporters would find a last minutes excuse by
postponing the polling in fabricating a crisis to avoid the defeat were
surprised when Doe ensure the conduct of the election on time (on October 15,
1985). This passage indeed suggested that political leaders of the day and
their followers sensed there would be vote rigging before the elections were
held. Contesting parties against the Doe’s NDPL were the Liberia Action
Party’s (LAP) Jackson F. Doe, the Liberia Unification Party’s (LUP) Gabriel
William Kpolleh, and the Unity Party’s (UP) Edward Beyan Kesselly fielded
against the NDPL’s Samuel K. Doe who was then head of the ruling civil-military
regime of Interim National Assembly (INA). Already Doe banned the other two
political parties - Gabriel Baccus Mathews’ the United People’s Party (UPP) and
Dr. Amos Claudius Sawyer’s Liberia People’s Party (LPP); But Mr. Givens wrote
in his book that these two parties failed to be registered on ground that there
were attempts by them to breach constitutional provisions, amongst others.
As stated earlier, the elections itself was held with crowds
enthusiastically amidst these uncertainties, with partisans of participating
opposition parties which formed an alliance to support behind LAP’s Jackson
Doe chanting “co-co-leo-co, co-co-leo-co” (sound of a rooster crow)
was everywhere there were polling. This obviously signified that the
majority of the electorates voted for the Liberia Action Party of Jackson F.
Doe which has a rooster as an emblem of his Liberia Action Party.
Notwithstanding the enthusiasms that attended the process in the hope that the
elections would have a peaceable and desirable outcome, the results, to the
contrary, were controversial as the Head of State, General Samuel K. Doe was
announced winner by the Emmet Harmon Bench of the Special Elections Commission
(SECOM), now the National Elections Commission under the protection of heavily
armed military guards. Besides the Presidential contest, 314 candidates 90
contested seats in the National Legislature (26 in the Senate and 64 in the
House of Representatives) at the time (SECOM, 1985).
Cllr. Harmon announced, as Chairman of the Special Elections Commission, under
gunpoint at the Unity Conference Center on the Outskirt of Monrovia that of the
518,872 valid votes cast reported, the NDPL’s Samuel Doe – the incumbent
garnered 264,364 votes; 137, 270 vote were allotted to Jackson F. Doe of LAP;
LUP’s Gabriel William Kpolleh was allotted 59, 965 and while UP’s Edwards
Kesselly was allotted 57, 273 votes respectively.
But the tally reported which put incumbent Samuel K. Doe ahead as the winner of
the election did the country more evil than good. It triggered condemnation
nationwide amongst the leading and influential political figures who, with
Doe’s attempted to silence them with the use of the national army - the Armed
Forces of Liberia (AFL), fled into exile, regroup and returned with guns,
thereby ending the Doe regime at the expense of the loss of more than 250,000
lives and the destruction of millions worth of public and private properties.
Surely the rigging of the 1985 elections brought untold suffering
on the country when the fratricidal civil debacle ensued.
Another ugly electoral event was the process of the 1997 elections, which
followed the fratricidal civil debacle that lasted for more than 14 years of
our national existence. During this election which brought Charles
Ghankay Taylor to power as elected President, the elections were marred with
acrimonies, tension and chaos. The Liberian elite politicians were being warned
against electing warlords, but to choose a leader who is not blemished with
war. Some members of the international community, specifically the United
States Embassy run Jingles in the electronic media and the print outlets
with some stating, “THERE ARE GOOD PEOPLE AND BAD PEOPLE IN
LIBERIA;’ LET THE GOOD PEOPLE WIN.” But this simple and
well-structured message of warning did not resonate with Liberians. Instead,
the multitude of the Liberian people jumped into the streets chanting in favor
of Mr. Taylor, “YOU KILL MY MA, YOU KILL MY PA, I WILL VOTE FOR YOU….” to
the amazement of the international community. But what happened
when Taylor was eventually elected President? The country slipped back to war
and things went worst.
Vote-Rigging
Consequences
The
world over, elections are always issue based. This is because the entire
process is about making choices for better living. During electoral processes
those who aspired to leadership proffer themselves forward and showcase their
qualities of leadership, giving electorates the opportunity to make choices for
elective positions from amongst them. But this process which characterizes
showing allegiance to political institutions and those the put forward to
participate in those process are serious undertakings that tied to livelihoods
and betterment not of than individual but that of the country and it people. It
is therefore a life game that can set a country and its people ablaze.
During the period of 1989-1996 Liberians who fled the country for
fear for reprisal after a highly contested and rigged presidential regrouped in
exiled and decided to return with phases of armed belligerence aimed at
overthrowing the NDPL regime of President Samuel Doe. This laid the basis for
the dreadful Liberia Civil war.
In the first place after a purported Coup led by M. M. Flanzamington, Doe's
brother-in-law who happened to be commander of the Presidential Guard
Battalion, and other allegedly attempts reportedly made on the Presidency
failed. Additionally, former Commanding General of the People’s Redemption
Council, General Thomas Quiwonkpah led military Coup from Sierra Leone against
President Samuel Doe on November 12, 1985. Quiwonkpah was one of the 17
enlisted men that Master-Sergeant Doe led when the People’s Redemption Council
toppled the True Whig Party regime of President William R. Tolbert.
Both Doe and Quiwonkpah had a brawl over the removal of the latter from the
Brigade Headquarters at the Barclay Training Center as Commanding General, and
Quiwonkpah finally fled into exile at the West Point Base of the United States,
according to reports. The November 12 1985 Coup was put down by soldiers
loyal to President Doe and Quiwonkpah was killed. It was speculated that
opposition politicians and other Liberian that fled the country rallied the
international community to fund the coming of Quiwonkpah to Liberia.
It was four years after when Charles McArthur Taylor, on December 24, 1989,
announced at the Butuo Border of Liberia with Ivory Coast that he was coming to
remove Doe from power Taylor from power. The incident resulted to a full skill
civil war, which was one of Africa's bloodiest, claimed the lives of more than
200,000 Liberians and further displaced a million others into refugee camps in
neighboring countries. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)
intervened and succeeded in preventing Charles Taylor from capturing Monrovia.
Prince Johnson--who had been a member of Taylor's National Patriotic Front of
Liberia (NPFL) but broke away because of policy differences--formed the
Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL). Johnson's forces
captured and killed Doe on September 9, 1990.
Elections were held in 1997 after the death of Does. But the conduct of
the people of the country towards the election of President Taylor triggered
another round of civil war in fall of the 1990s up to 2003. On June 4,
2003 in Accra, Ghana, ECOWAS facilitated the inauguration of peace talks among
the Government of Liberia, civil society, and the rebel groups called "Liberians
United for Reconciliation and Democracy" (LURD) and "Movement for
Democracy in Liberia" (MODEL). LURD and MODEL largely represent elements
of the former ULIMO-K and ULIMO-J factions that fought Taylor during Liberia's
previous civil war (1989-1996).
Also on June 4, 2003, the Chief Prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra
Leone issued a press statement announcing the opening of a sealed March 7
indictment of Liberian President Charles Taylor for "bearing the greatest
responsibility" for atrocities in Sierra Leone since November 1996.
By July 17, 2003 the Government of Liberia, LURD, and MODEL signed a
cease-fire that envisioned a comprehensive peace agreement within 30 days. The
three parties subsequently broke that cease-fire repeatedly, which resulted in
bitter fighting that eventually reached downtown Monrovia. (US Department of State,
January 20, 2009 to January 20, 2017.)
Similarly, the 1927 election was between the TWP and the People’s Party was
fraudulent. Following the election, Faulkner accused members of the True Whig
Party government of using slave labor at home and selling slaves to the Spanish
colony of Fernando Po, as well as involving
the Army in the process.
Despite the government's denials and a refusal to cooperate, the League
of Nations established the "International
Commission of Inquiry into the Existence of Slavery and Forced Labor in the
Republic of Liberia", under the chairmanship of British jurist Cuthbert
Christy, to determine the extent of the problem. U.S.
President Herbert
Hoover briefly suspended relations to press Monrovia into
compliance.
In 1930, the committee's report was published, and although it could not
substantiate charges of slavery and forced labor, it implicated government
officials, including both President King and his Vice President Allen
Yancy of profiting from forced labor, which was equated
to slavery. Accordingly, there were also suggestions about putting
Liberia into trusteeship.
As a result, the House
of Representatives began impeachment procedures against
King, who quickly resigned.
The
aforesaid dictates that Liberia is indeed on the crossroad. Clearly, the first
time that power was turned over from one party to the other peacefully in
Liberia was in 2017 when the former governing Unity Party handed power to the
ruling Coalition for Democratic Change of African and world football
icon, George Manneh Weah. The example set by the UP was unique and a
landmark precedent in the Republic of Liberia over the decades, which was
therefore hailed by nations of sub-Sahara Africa, celebrated by the entire
continent, and supported by the world over, reason being that election is the
right or power to choice, or privilege granted a person or group of people
to make choice. If the above is true, there is no need for another
group of people or a political party to infringe on this universal right of
another in a manner unacceptably a chaotic one. It is against this background
that we relate the sequence of these consequences of rigged elections in the
country, using the two of the worst cases in the c country - the 1927
Barclay-Faulkner election and the Samuel Doe- Jackson Doe contest of 1985.
These two elections were unprecedentedly labelled the country's worst political
contests and accordingly has impacted the people negatively.
The result or aftermath of the Barclay-Faulkner election of 1927 exposed the
country to the practice of force labor and slavery and subjected the country to
external investigation a result of which suggested the Liberia should be a
trustee state. On the other hand, the outcome of the Samuel
Doe- Jackson Doe brought about untold suffering, massive deaths and left
hundreds of millions worth of public and private properties destroyed while the
1997 process invited a situation which was further a recipe and a yardstick
used to destroy the remaining infrastructure after the 1990 debacle that
resulted from the 1985 process.
Conclusion
But one reason that led to these catastrophic national crises or blemishes on
the nation was simply greed by those who are duty bearers, intolerance by state
bureaucrats and insensitivity on the part of stakeholders and the very people.
Since we are contending with issues for a dispensation that may be considered
the third republic, may I conclude that these same vices are showing up. The
people, especially stake holders and duty bearers, are ignoring the reality
that their mutual intolerance and greed for state power, coupled
with rampant corruption in state bureaucracy and acute state insecurity
are dangerous to the 2023 process. The regrouping of some former rebel
generals in the name of defending the he CDC government which should be
protected by state security forces, the formation of militants by Montserrado
County District 10 Representative Yekeh Kolubah and the militarization of the
past 2022 Lofa County Senatorial Election are proof of
introduction of militancy in the ensuing electoral process. Such
is reminiscent of the 1985 electoral process when the incumbent NDPL Government
imported ruthless Sierra Leonean thugs wearing red T-shirts and berets against
the opposition to ensure that the civilians population – loyalists and leaders
of the alliance of three opposition parties namely LAP, LUP and UP are cowed to
submission for a win. There were random deaths as bodies, like it is today,
that were being found in the streets. For instance, the cases of Esther Parker
and policeman Melvin Pyne were amongst the toll of
those secretly killed and found in the streets like it is at
presently with the mysterious death of Princess Cooper, Giftie Lama and her
boss Mr. Peters from the LRA; and the mysterious deaths including that of the
three guys for which the government ably defended Saint Moses who reportedly
sent them to a place from where they were never seen again. Memories of
elections of the mid-1980s are afresh when the level ruthlessness display by
the power-that-be drove the opposition people into exile where they regrouped
and influenced the 1990 civil crises.
These scenarios are seemingly manifesting. There are lots of Liberians outside
the country in opposition who were not satisfied with the governing pattern of
present regime, and are equally responding to threats being made by the
government, specifically with reference to remarks by President Weah when he
used Isaac Winker’s Dominion Church pulpit to lash at the opposition. The
President did not mince his words when he said registered his preparedness to
deal with opposition people for whatever reason he pointed to. What
is at stake by this assertion is that President and his the government did not
mindfully exhibit sensitivity towards the plight of the people. I believe
that the CDC government should allow for a free and fair election, and the
opposition is equally advised to remain thoughtful
for the ordinary people who have nowhere to run to. We shouldn’t
revisit the past, political stakeholders should be mutually tolerate each and
be sensitive to the plight of the people. It is time to uphold the
precedence of 2017, the cherished memory that was hailed by the international
community
ABOUT
THE AUTHOR: The author of this article, Mr. Bill K. Jarkloh, is a candidate for
a graduate degree in peacebuilding. A lecturer at the University of Liberia,
the author who is a 2011 graduate of the University of Liberia holds a Bachelor
of Arts degree in Mass Communication. He garnered extensive experience of
Liberian politics since 1985 as he walked through the ranks of the independent
media of the country from rank of cub reporter through news and feature editor
ranks to that of editor-in-chief amongst others with various newspapers.
He also served the Embassy of Ghana as Executive Officer for Information
(2005-2009) at the time the Embassy was the doyen of the diplomatic corps and
Chairman of the International Contact Group of Liberia (ICGL). Presently, the
author is media trainer and field officer of the Liberia Media Center and a
lecturer at the University of Liberia.
