By Robert S. Kollie Contributing Writer
In what has been described as a groundswell of sympathy votes, Senator George Manneh Weah may well garner more swing votes in an event of a presidential run-off election. This has made his supporters to smell victory.
Based on interviews with a cross section of citizens conducted by this writer, Weah is poised to win a large number of undecided voters.
Many who have been unattached to the two dominant parties, inclusive of Weah’s Coalition for Democratic Change and the ruling Unity Party represented by Vice President Joseph Nyumah Boakai, have decided to support the international football legend turned politician.
Those spoken with say this is more so because citizens are increasingly seeing him a sort of “victim” of political bullying machinated by local and international forces. At the same time, the CDC’s potential runoff rival, Unity Party has been sending out confusing signals since the end of the October 10–campaigning for the now aborted Nov 7 runoff and at the same time decrying the polls as massively fraudulent and agitating for a rerun.
This support for Weah and his CDC (comprising the NPP and PDPL) has even appeared to have grown stronger with the mid-week assertion by the United States Embassy in Monrovia that they maintain “confidence in the integrity of the October 10 elections.”
In the statement making the rounds of local and international media, the Americans, who have a huge sway of influence in Liberia, related that none of the local and international observation groups expressed any doubts in the conduct of the elections.
The Americans have also called upon the expected finalists in the elections – Weah’s CDC and Vice President Boakai – “to focus on constructively engaging each other and voters as they prepare to compete in the runoff.”
Ordinary Liberian citizens also share similar thoughts.
“We cannot imagine that bogus fraud allegation in the conduct of the October 10th election could be given credence by the Supreme Court to wrest power from Weah who has amply proven to be the popular choice in the country,” says Jobeth Nagbe, a youth activist in Monrovia’s Paynesville community.
Nagbe, like a number of other young people, expressed readiness to resist any effort to subvert the democratic process in the country and expressed hope that the Supreme Court will be honest and fair in its judgment to see the hoax in the case filed by Cllr. Charles Brumskine of the Liberty Party.
Marilyn Sebah, a senior political science student of the University of Liberia says she did not vote for Weah in the first ballot but given “the barefaced political conspiracy hatched against the young man we are going to mobilize to canvass for votes for him whenever they call for re-run or the run-off.”
Also speaking in the same regard at the Attaya Base tea shop, seven of ten respondents have similar denunciatory comments about the electoral fraud case. They see a sore loser and sour grape exhibition by Cllr. Charles Brumskine as a grand scheme supported by both a jittery ruling party and subtly condoned by sub-regional and continental powers.
“We cannot imagine that people who have poor democratic credential can come here to teach us about unfounded elections fraud,” says High School Teacher Roland Gaye, alluding to Togo’s Faure Gnasingbe who, for instance has been tagged with electoral fraud in maintaining power in Togo.
For marketer Ma Baindu Kiawu of the Redlight business district near Monrovia, she says they are confused about the political development to distort the result. She notes that the political history of the country has shown that when one group of politicians decide to hold onto power by all means it can lead to serious backlash that will further destabilize the country.
Ma Baindu has expressed hope that the will of God as indicated in the overwhelming choice of the Liberian people for change through Weah must be respected and given the power without further creating conditions for women and children to suffer.
Meanwhile, there has been more confidence among Weah’s supporter in the face of the latest ruling by the Supreme Court of Liberia, resisting efforts by the Unity Party to continue adding witnesses and sub poenas in their alleged fraud case at the Elections Commission.
Weah’s supporters see this as a ploy to prolong the case at the NEC and courts, beyond statutory periods.
According to Liberian law, the NEC has 30 days to investigate complaints arising from the polls.