Africa-Press – Liberia. Unity Party has criticized President George Weah for “shamelessly” refusing to give the former ruling party credit for its role in improving Liberia’s road networks, something which they claimed the government is boasting about.
In its response to the President’s State of the Nation Address yesterday, the UP, which ruled the country for 12 years (2006-2017), used the opportunity to highlight the party’s achievements in government, and ambition for governing the country once again; while arguing that President Weah has presided over an economy that has left working people struggling.
Delivering the UP’s response, the party spokesperson, Cornelia Kruah-Togba, did not mince her words to directly attack the central theme of the President’s address, which was roads, roads, and more roads.
“Yesterday, President Weah boasted of the ongoing construction of about 388 kilometers of roads (including the Lofa Road) and shamelessly refused to give credits to the role played by the Unity Party-led government. Here is what the CDC-led government refused to tell you: that we concluded the financing mechanism to pave key remaining major economic corridors and established the Arab Consortium (Kuwaiti Fund, Saudi Fund, Abu Dhabi, OPEC, BADEA) to provide concessional loans,” Cornelia
added.
“President Weah also refused to tell you that: the road project in Maryland commenced in 2015; Harper-Ivorian Border, Harper Junction-Pleebo-Karloken-Fish Town, River Gee County was constructed by the Unity Party Led Government. Additionally, as far as domestic resource mobilization; we left in place financing infrastructure, the Road Fund which was established through legislation in 2015, ” she noted. “We also negotiated SECRAMP (South Eastern Corridor Road Access Management Project) with the World Bank providing guarantee for the financing arrangement to pave from Ganta to Zwedru using the Road Fund Mechanism.”
“Also, as part of the Trans-West African Highway Project, we secured a 50% grant from the European Union and a concessional loan from the African Development Bank to finance the pavement from Logatuo to Sanniquellie, Ganta to Yekepa, which commenced in 2015 and financed by the GoL. The Coca Cola Factory – ELWA Junction road expansion project financed by the World Bank,” noted the UP.
These projects, the UP Spokesperson said, are the same roads President Weah referred to yesterday “when he boasted of ongoing 388 kilometers for which the CDC government will be only too willing to take credit.”
The President in his Jan. 24 speech, boasted of the boom in infrastructural development, particularly road connectivity, which he described as a key accomplishment of his administration and an issue around which he is expected to build his re-election campaign.
“It remains an important priority of my administration to ensure the full accessibility of the entire country through the maintenance and rehabilitation of the existing 4,200 kilometers of urban and secondary roads across our country,” President Weah noted.
The President also added that by improving road connectivity throughout the country, basic economic activity will increase due to the free movement of goods and services.
However, for Mrs. Togba, tarnishing that record allows the UP to remind voters of the contrast between their agenda and President Weah’s, as well as ensuring that the UP is well-positioned to compete in and win the 2023 elections.
It is a move that breaks away from the past and lessons learned from the blunder of its political leader, Joseph Boakai, who informed voters in 2017 that the government, under the leadership of then-President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and himself, “squandered opportunities” instead of boasting about their achievements.
Now, as the 2023 election is on the horizon, it is about selling their success stories against President Weah’s own and, by doing so, they believe they have a chance to return to the helm of government in 2023 as it may force the voters to compare the UP’s tenure in power versus that of President Weah’s Coalition for Democratic Change.
Thus giving voters the choice to make decisions on policies that differ between the former ruling party and the CDC during next year’s election.
And in a nod to attracting more female supporters and potential voters, especially among the youth, the party leaders this time around opted to have a woman respond to the President’s address.
This highlights UP’s focus on getting back the women’s support, which helped to propel them to power under Ellen Johnson Sirleaf for 12-years.
The UP further that the complex road network implemented by the Sirleaf administration cannot be compared with the pavement of community roads in Rehab and other communities by the CDC Government of President Weah, which can be described as alleyways that do not yield major economic returns.
It added that President Weah should not just lament about inheriting a few million dollars in debt from the UP government, but should be honest to inform the public that he inherited a 60 million dollars Ministerial Complex; and a reconstructed 4-turbine hydro-electric plant, as well as 38 Megawatts of functional Heavy Fuel-oil Power Plants currently unused by the government.
“The Unity Party had a full grasp of Liberia’s endowment and potential when it inherited the wasteland of a country in 2006. Roads and bridges were destroyed, making Monrovia a tapestry of burnt-out and bullet-riddled buildings. The streets had large craters. Social services and administrative structures were nonexistent throughout the country,” Cornelia said.
“The Mt. Coffee hydro dam was destroyed. The country was dark. Liberia was burdened down with inherited external debt of US$4.9 billion with little possibility of further borrowing. Months of arrears owed civil servants and other public sector employees. The country was viewed as a criminal pariah state. We brought this country back to life with proven leaders who put in the work, proven leaders who made tough choices, proven leaders who listened, and proven leaders who put the nation above party and self. We delivered this country and we can do it again,” Cornelia added.
The UP just did not stop there, it criticized the President for his remarks about ‘inherited debt’ when, in comparison, they inherited loan repayment responsibility of US$4.9 billion debt and for which it successfully negotiated a debt waiver.
Some of that debt, the UP said was more than 50 years old from previous governments, and at the same time,
secured US$257 million committed funds from the US Government Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) as our first compact in 2016.
Unfortunately, the UP said, Liberia now under the CDC Government lost the chance of the second compact of over US$500 million due to the gross incompetence and mismanagement of the Weah government to pass the MCC indicators over the past four years. It is interesting to note that the three other Mano River Union countries qualified for the second compact.
Meanwhile, the UP said the crisis the Weah government currently faces in providing electricity for citizens, which has led to rationing of power, is not a result of lack of the facility to provide electricity but the inability of the CDC-led government to effectively and efficiently utilize these facilities.
It added that President Weah did not report, that because of his administration’s incompetence, one of the turbines at Mt. Coffee constructed by the UP government has already been destroyed, contributing to the present electricity crisis in the country.
“Fellow Liberians: The Unity Party’s infrastructural blueprint for development was well thought out for long-term and sustainable development. The emphasis was on those corridors that would spur growth, enhance agricultural development together with the promotion of value chain and jobs creation. It was left to the incoming CDC Government as should be in the interest of continuity,” Cornelia noted. “Health care delivery services, a crucial human capital development pillar of the so-called PAPD, was insufficiently reported on by President Weah in his Annual Message to the National Legislature. A pattern is seen in the past 3 years of his Administration. It is not a slip-up; health care is not a priority for the Weah Administration. It is without a doubt that the health sector is crumbling.”
However, the UP said if given power again, they will implement all the neglected cornerstones in the investment plan of building a resilient health system, that encompasses: emergency preparedness, health security, and response; building health care workers capacity; having more trained health workers at all levels, and adequately compensating them; increase financing to the health sector; improve the quality of health care to our people, that underpins universal health coverage and primary health care.
” Our country is at a crossroads. We have a golden opportunity at the start of this decade to enter an age of the Liberian Renaissance. We have within our grasp the opportunity to create prosperity for all Liberians,” the former ruling party noted. “We have a chance to build a peaceful and stable nation for ourselves and future generations. We stand at the cusp of final victory to end the struggle for social justice, equality, and inclusive development. President Weah’s Annual Message does not convince us that his government has the capacity or the capability to come up with the roadmap to that destination.”
Cornelia also added that the President’s State of the Nation Address was far from the realities on the ground and is proof that President Weah and his entire government have detached themselves from the sufferings of the people.
“Imagine President Weah declaring that ‘the state of the economy is stable and the state of the nation is strong’ when more and more people are jobless, parents cannot afford to send their kids to school and certainly many Liberians cannot afford to go to seek medical attention even at clinics,” she said.
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