PHOTO: Edith Gongloe-Weh, defeated Nimba County Senatorial candidate; Some crucial factors were clearly in her favor…
New Thinking-with Joe Bartuah
In its April 8, 2021 report, headlined, “Supreme Court Finally Rules Against CPP Sen. Candidate Edith Gongloe-Weh”, The News Public Trust disclosed that the nation’s highest court had ruled in favor of Senator Prince Johnson’s Movement for Democracy and Reconstruction (MDR) candidate, Mr. Jeremiah Koung, basically confirming that he had won the December 8, 2020 midterm senatorial election in Nimba County.
The paper went on, “According to the Supreme Court ruling, it was acknowledged that there was fraud and irregularities, but there was no sufficient evidence to overturn the election results, despite those issues raised of ballots being placed in cartons and in some places there was intimidation.”
In a similar report on the same date, The Daily Observer noted, “In the ruling on April 8, 2021 the court said, ‘Candidate Gongloe-Weh and her lawyers didn’t provide substantial evidence to prove their case of electoral fraud in the December 8, 2020 election.’”
Well, the substantive issue here is that the nation’s highest court of law and “final arbiter of constitutional issues” (article 66) confirmed in its ruling that indeed, there were frauds and irregularities in the December 8th midterm senatorial election in Nimba County.
As per the two newspapers’ accounts quoted above, even though the Court did confirm the uncovering of frauds as the appellant had maintained from the onset, its point of divergence or disagreement with the appellant, Mrs. Edith Gongloe-Weh, was that the frauds and irregularities which had characterized the election in certain parts of the county, especially the ancestral home region of Senator Prince Johnson, as pinpointed by the CPP senatorial candidate and her legal team, were not “sufficient” to merit the reversal of the NEC’s decision. Interestingly, the NEC (National Election Commission) had served as a co-defendant as well as an umpire during the preliminary litigation.
However, to the best of my knowledge, as per those reports, the court did not specifically spell out its metrics of what, within the purview of its authority and reasoning, would constitute sufficiency. In other words, what would have constituted “sufficient” or “substantial” evidence in the eyes of the Supreme Court? Obviously, it’s difficult to surmise it, in the absence of an unequivocal specification or stipulation.
When I read those two news stories, I simply reasoned that the April 8, 2021 ruling was the Supreme Court’s way of stamping its approval of what seem like ongoing political intrigues, bizarre connivance, troubling cabal-like collaboration which have basically degraded the post-conflict status of Nimba County, a county of pivotal potential to a sort of principality, or a sort of political sole proprietorship for Prince Johnson in Liberia. With such a dubious status, Nimba County basically has an uncrowned king, who’s wielding enormous power within the county, to the extent that his whims must be carried out, no matter what.
In any case, the current Supreme Court bench should be given kudos for its courage in, at least, acknowledging that frauds and irregularities did occur in some parts of Nimba County in the December 8, 2020 election. At least that’s a record for posterity, notwithstanding the undesirably adversarial outcome.
In reflecting on the high court’s contention that Mrs. Gongloe-Weh did not present “sufficient” evidence, I’m reminded about an old story my cousin told me about a complicated incident that occurred in Boston, Massachusetts a little over three decades ago. The incident was initially narrated to me in 2002; I had newly arrived in Boston when I heard about the incident. I later researched it and got the details. It was a tragic incident which also had a racial undertone, but for me, the crucial point of intersection of that terrifying incident with the case under review has to do with the Liberian Supreme Court’s insistence on “sufficient” or “substantive” evidence, amid extraordinary efforts by the opposing parties—Movement for Democracy and Reconstruction (MDR) and the Liberia National Election Commission (NEC)—to conceal or ignore whatever evidence. And so, “evidence” is the key word here.
That tragic incident happened on the night of October 23, 1989 in the Mission Hill neighborhood of Boston and it had to do with the cruelty and criminality of a young man identified as Charles “Chuck” Stuart and his gorgeous wife. Carol, Mr. Stuart’s wife was pregnant at the time. Both were born in 1959; they were just entering their 30s and had been married for four years. Although young, the couple (both white) was an economically potent middle class, which simply means that they were not poor.
Charles and Carol Stuart were expecting their first child, whom they had already pre-named Christopher. But apparently Charles was possessed by the devil of insatiable greed. And so, unknown to his wife, he reportedly took multiple life insurance policies on her. He then began exceedingly showering his wife with all the love, care and affection expected of a good husband, except that he turned out to be a horrible husband.
With just a few months to her due date, Carol began attending maternity classes during the evening hours at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the Longwood District of Boston. As Carol attended the maternity classes, Charles’s affection got ostensibly re-enforced in an, “I-will-spoil-you-with-love” fashion. He would give Carol a ride, drop her off at about 6:30 p.m. for her expecting mothers’ class and then promptly pick her up at 8:30 p.m. But as it later turned out, Charles Stuart had an evil intent; he had a devilish “Plan-B” to wreak evil on Carol, his wedded wife for four years. Charles Stuart had apparently been besieged by an evil, insatiable spirit and so, he was getting impatient. Of course, he had been paying some huge insurance premiums here and there, and so, he was eager to enrich himself, to reap the benefits of his devilish enterprise.
And so, on the night of October 23, 1989, in less than five minutes after he had picked up his 7-month pregnant wife from the compound of the sprawling Brigham and Women Hospital, Charles Stuart dialed 911 and called the police to give the horrifying news: His very pregnant wife had been shot in her head by an armed robber, a tall black man wearing a black sweat-suit! Stuart claimed that he, too, had been shot in the stomach!! All the emergency crews—police, ambulance and fire service rushed to the scene and saw the couple in a pool of blood!
Carol was quickly rushed to the same Brigham and Women Hospital, less than a mile away from the crime scene. Doctors desperately tried to save her life, but in the end, they were not successful; by 3 a.m. she finally succumbed to her devastating injuries. Before then, they had already carried out an emergency c-section to save her baby. He, too, languished in pains in an incubator until he passed away 17 days later. Meanwhile, Charles Stuart himself was rushed to the nearby Boston City Hospital (as Boston Medical Center was called then). And so, Carol and her expectant son died in that horrific incident while Charles Stuart survived.
Due to the horrendous cruelty, Boston was plunged into a frenzy of fear and rage. Young and middle age black men were literally at the receiving end. Then Boston Mayor Ray Flynn ordered an additional 100 officers to be put on “special assignments”, specifically in the predominantly black districts of the city. The mayor told the police to be “extremely aggressive in cracking down on people who are using guns to kill innocent people.”
As it later turned out, the mayor’s order was basically a license for harassment and torture for the police against black men in Boston. Almost every black young man became a suspect, if not an accused, in the eyes of the Boston police. Massachusetts politicians immediately reinstated the death penalty!
For a state with a population of only eight percent black, the mayor’s order led to severe repressive tactics by the police. State and Federal law enforcement agencies swung into full gear. Who was that tall black guy that heartlessly shot a charming white couple, both of them just 30-years old? The police and FBI began carrying out massive arrests of black men, in search of the tall black man, as Stuart had alleged. A lot of young black men, especially those with previous criminal records were arbitrarily rounded up and incarcerated. But as the days went by, the racial undertone of the police dragnet became glaring; there were outcries in Boston and even beyond, because racial bigotry was again rearing its ugly head.
Whether responsible black men were going to, or returning from the grocery store, work or church, most of them were suddenly stopped and humiliatingly searched; that was during the heydays of the discriminatory “stop and frisk” policy. Some of them were ordered to lie on their bellies on dirty concrete sidewalks and in public squares as they were being searched at gun points. At the same time, Boston and other national media outlets were heaping praises on Charles Stuart as a heroic husband who had tried to save the precious life of his beloved wife.
It was during such tension that Matthew Stuart, Charles’s younger brother, apparently pricked by his conscience, or cornered by detectives, confessed details of the heinous crime to the police. He told law enforcement officials that indeed, his brother—Charles Stuart—had actually murdered his wife, in anticipation of getting some huge life insurance benefits; that Charles had given him (Matthew) the revolver gun, which he carried to Revere, eight miles away from the crime scene and threw it in the river, obviously to hide the key evidence of the crime.
By the time Matthew made that appalling confession, Charles had recuperated from his injuries and had been discharged from the hospital. Moreover, Charles Stuart had already received $100,000 from one of his insurance arrangements and had bought a luxury sports utility vehicle. He was also spotted in a jewelry store in Peabody, Massachusetts, buying some gifts for “a secret girlfriend.” However, once Matthew Stuart made that bombshell confession, Charles Stuart’s indictment was imminent. Unfortunately, Stuart was not apprehended as he scurried to the lower deck of the double-decker Tobin Bridge and plunged himself 145 feet into the Mystic River on January 4, 1990. So was the sad end to the evil deeds of Charles Stuart.
Why am I bothering you with this epic narrative? One word or a phrase suffices here: “Evidence” or “sufficient evidence.” Why did Charles Stuart give his gun he had used to stage the murder his wife for selfish financial reasons to his younger brother to carry it and throw it in the river? “Evidence.” Folks, in as much as they are nefarious and even pernicious, criminals are not fools. Some criminals might display some level of idiocy, or buffoonery, some might proffer+ certain level of peculiarities or idiosyncratic tendencies, but that doesn’t mean that criminals are predominantly foolish.
If anything, sleazy people, con artists, scoundrels harbor the notion that they’re smarter than the rest of the larger society. In fact, criminals’ general conviction that they’re smarter than all others is the principal impetus of criminality. Those who engage in shady deeds are stubbornly convinced that they can do whatever they wish and get away with it.
Are you wondering why they think that way? It’s simply because they believe that they can conceal whatever evidence to their advantage, so as to ultimately get their aim accomplished. Criminals are abundantly aware that law, or jurists are inherently obsessed with “evidence” and so, from time immemorial, they have made it their foremost mission to formidably conceal, if not destroy whatever evidence that might eventually entangle them to a given crime. Whether it’s at the rudimentary level, or most sophisticated echelon, potential culprits have been relentless in their drive to hide any trace of evidence.
Have you ever wondered while a child would prefer to pilfer from their parents rather than steal the whole stuff? It’s because no child wants to be caught. And so, whether it’s a jar of pennies or candies, kids would prefer taking a little and leaving the rest so that their parents wouldn’t notice the shortage. If seemingly innocent kids can exert strenuous efforts to conceal evidence in such a sleazy fashion, just re-imagine the sophistication of scoundrels, con artists, and hardcore blue-collar and white-collar criminal suspects in obliterating whatever traces of evidence.
In the particular case under review, if innocent, amateurish kids can go the proverbial extra miles to conceal evidence, it’s an illusion, or it’s simply naive to even entertain the notion that a man with a brutish past, who was once law onto himself, engaged in all sorts of indescribable activities with impunity, will embark on an egregious mission of cavaliering his whims against the popular will of the vast majority of voters, intimidate them, wage psychological warfare on the people, impose his self-serving caprices, commit massive frauds and then knowingly leave glaring traces of his malfeasance and infringements to adduce evidence against his vital interests.
Harboring such notion is tantamount to implying that scoundrels are fools, which is absolutely far from the truth. In any case, credit should be given to the nation’s highest court, for at least acknowledging that indeed, the December 8, 2020 senatorial midterm election in Nimba County was characterized by frauds, even if it went on to be dismissive of such frauds as not being “sufficient” to tilt the election in the opposite direction.
I have long held that any given society is like a marathon competition. On that nearly 27-miles route are two well-known proverbial marathoners—Good and Evil. Evil tends to be very fast and highly witty. Evil is prone to conceal or camouflage its modus operandi, it’s inclined to outwit, to outsmart, but as a street-corner Liberian adage would say, “Ninety-nine days for rogue, one day for master.” In other words, those who callously flout the law would continue to delude themselves that they’re smarter than all others until they’re apprehended, the December 8, 2020 voters frauds in Nimba being no exception.
On the other hand, Good begins its marathon in a slow motion fashion. Whereas Evil is incessantly on the lookout, craving for short cuts, maneuvering its way to an egregious end, Good is primarily preoccupied with fairness, impartiality and shared dividends or outcomes that will be ultimately beneficial for a given community or society. The idea of a disinterested umpire in every competition is primarily informed by the realization of such continuous struggle between Good and Evil; between those inclined to scrupulously abide by the rules and those brazenly bent on circumventing the law. Even in a football (soccer) game, the referee’s foremost job description is to ensure fairness by penalizing those who cheat rather than categorizing or rationalizing cheating as “sufficient” or “insufficient” as the Liberian Supreme Court opined on April 8, 2021.