By Our Staff Writer
The candidate of the opposition Liberty Party (LP), Mr. Abraham Darius Dillon is now the declared winner of the Montserrado County By-election by the National Elections Commission (NEC), defeating the candidate of President George Weah’s ruling CDC with a huge margin.
His ticket was endorsed by the four-party group, Collaborating Political Parties which including the former ruling Unity Party, Alternative National Congress and the All Liberian Party.
Dillon soundly defeated the CDC candidate, Ms. Paulita Wie by 102,549 to 63,971 votes, representing 55.74% and 34.77% respectively.
NEC’s Chairman, Cllr. Jerome Korkoya made the announcement on Friday during a news conference at the headquarters of the Commission, which reflected one hundred percent tallying of the Senatorial race.
However, despite his massive victory, Dillon is suspicious of NEC’s handling of the District #15 Representative By-election, which has seen complaints coming from the frontrunner, Ms. Telia Urey of the ALP.
NEC’s August 2, 2019 provisional results puts Ms. Urey, daughter of ALP leader Benoni Urey at 5, 573 votes against CDC Abu Kamara who has so far got 5, 417 of the votes tallied.
Senator elect Dillon on Friday threatened to lead a crowd of protesters to the NEC headquarters by Monday so that the national electoral body can display the tally sheets they’ve taken these results from, as records in their possession show that Ms. Urey has won with a wide margin.
NEC had repeatedly rubbished claims of any manipulation of the voting process and said it is professionally tallying the votes in line with its constitutional mandate and timeline. Under the law, the commission has between 7-15 days to release the elections results.
Meanwhile Telia Urey, who is claiming victory, says she won’t accept any results that doesn’t declare her the winner of the July 29, 2019 Representative race.
Anything other than that, she’ll be demanding a rerun of the Montserrado County District #15 polls.
Telia’s supporters began their protest on Friday opposite the headquarters of NEC in Monrovia’s Sinkor suburb.