PHOTO: The Author is former Monrovia City Mayor
By Jefferson T. Koijee
The September 27 joint communiqué sends a decisive message: the people’s opposition is coming together with purpose, resolve, and a shared commitment to Liberia’s future. The ANC, CDC, MOVEE, MPC, and ULDP have pledged to defend constitutional democracy, demand accountability, and build an alternative that answers to the Liberian people.
Mr. Boakai’s government should stop focusing on how to obstruct this genuine and resolute opposition effort. Any initiative designed to silence, divide, or frustrate the people’s lawful political will is dead on arrival. The government should put that energy into solving the complex problems it was elected to address.
Poverty is crushing families. Unemployment is denying young people a future. And the University of Liberia has faced a prolonged disruption under Mr. Boakai’s government. Critics say it has remained closed longer than it did during Liberia’s fourteen years of civil war, and even longer than under Charles Taylor. That is a grave comparison. The government owes students a clear accounting of the days lost, a firm reopening plan, and the resources to keep the university operating.
Meanwhile, questions are being raised about reports of more than 107 delegates traveling to the United Nations at a total travel and hotel cost of over US$375,000. Publish the delegation list. Publish the itemized costs. Let the people see how their money was spent.
The communiqué demands answers on corruption allegations, major cocaine investigations, the rule of law, free speech, and the independence of the National Elections Commission. These demands will not disappear because the government finds them uncomfortable. The Liberian people deserve credible investigations, equal justice, and elections whose results reflect their votes.
Let the message be unmistakable: no intimidation, no manufactured division, and no interference with the people’s constitutional rights will stop this movement. Our struggle will be deliberate, organized, and unyielding. We will carry it into every county, every community, and ultimately to the ballot box in 2029.
The people’s victory is in sight. Their final redemption is our destination. JTK.