Liberia:Liberian opposition party closes in on ruling party in presidential race

Laaska News Oct. 16,2011

MONROVIA, Oct. 15 (Xinhua) — Liberia’s main opposition party, Congress for Democratic Change (CDC), is said to be closing on President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s Unity Party in the midst of claims of irregularities in the conduct of the Oct. 11 general and presidential elections by eight opposition parties in what seems to indicate a possible run-off in November.

This comes as the National Election Commission (NEC) Chairman, James M. Fromoyan, released the third progressive results on Saturday in the capital, Monrovia.

According to the results, the Unity Party presidential candidate accumulated 424,296, or 44.6 percent, of the total votes tallied so far, while the CDC obtained 298,425, or 31.4 percent, of the total votes.

NEC Chairman Fromoyan said the National Union for Democratic Progress of ex-warlord Prince Johnson maintained its third place position after accumulating 106,967, or 11.2 percent, of the total votes.

He said the results constitute 3,567 of the 4,457 polling places tallied and collated nation-wide. He said of the 1,020,960 votes tallied and collated so far, 951,902 are valid, while 69,068 are invalid.

Responding to a position statement by eight parties not to accept the results because of what they termed as flaws in the conduct of the Oct. 11 poll, Chairman Fromoyan urged all parties to go through the complaint process laid down by the NEC.

He observed that all political parties have carbon copies of results from all polling places, stressing that it is these same results that are being released to the public, and challenged all political parties to produce any result that contradicts the progressive results being released by the NEC.

Final results will be announced on Oct. 26, and if there is no absolute winner, a second round will commence immediately for run- off election on Nov. 8.

Meanwhile, the ruling Unity Party has called on its supporters to remain calm as the elections results are being announced. The party has urged its partisans to also have in mind that the NEC is the only entity, which has the power to announce official results in Liberia.

“We want our partisans to know the results are to be announced by the National Elections Commission which is the only body clothed with the authority to make such an announcement,” a statement from the party said.

The party also expressed satisfaction in the conduct of the polls so far. Addressing a news conference, Campaign Manager Tornarlah Vapilah said the early returns from the polls indicate that the UP is in a very strong position in 13 of the 15 counties, tying so far in Monsterrado with the CDC.

He thanked partisans of UP and the Liberian people for the peaceful conduct of elections that has passed without any report of violence.

According to him, the UP respects the results of the elections and promise that his partisans will always remain violence free, describing his partisans as law-abiding citizens, who have their country at heart.

“We acknowledge the significant role played by the National Elections Commission in the conduct of the polls and there were no reports of any irregularities during the voting process. We particularly want to extend our special thanks to our campaign poll workers, who diligently worked for the party during the electoral process,” he added.

“We also want to say thanks to our partisans, sympathizers, supporters and collaborating political parties, who turned out in their masses to vote for our party. We see this as a tribute to our standard bearer, vice standard bearer and legislative candidates, who campaigned vigorously throughout the country,” Tornarlah said.

He praised the local and foreign media for the critical role in the sustenance of democracy here, which is a further manifestation of the vibrancy of democracy in Liberia.

Xinhua.

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