DAVID A. YATES , DAVID S. MENJOR
Africa-Press – Liberia. We are not cheaters,” the Chairperson of the National Elections Commission has said in response to allegations that it plans to rig the October 10 polls.
Addressing a press conference yesterday, Davidetta Browne-Lansanah said the allegation was more than shocking, as the electoral body has no intention of betraying the trust of the Liberian people.
While committing the Commission to transparent elections “as it has done in the past,” Lansanah warned that political parties need to desist from making false accusations against the electoral body as it does not augur well for the electoral process.
“We are not cheaters. If you claim that the Commission will cheat and you are participating in the process, tomorrow, if you win, will you be telling the Liberian people that the Commission cheated for you to win? Let us please guide our utterances,” Lansanah said in a plea to politicians.
“The same organization that will confer legitimacy on you is the same organization you are denigrating and bringing to public disrepute—that we are cheaters here,” she said. “We don’t cheat anybody. What is in the ballot box is what we process and what we announce.”
The plea from Lansanah comes from an old video of Joseph Boakai, the presidential candidate of the opposition Unity Party, voicing concerns over the possibility of vote rigging by the ruling party of President George Weah.
In the video, which is about five months old, the former Vice President can be heard calling on Liberians to seriously protect their vote and resist any issues of electoral fraud.
“That’s why you have to protect it. If they think they will steal this election, you will not allow it,” Boakai told a cheering crowd in June, but the video of his speech became widely popular in the last few days. “Because if you do it, that’s the end of this country. We are not going to allow that.”
The former Vice President, however, did not provide any evidence of steps that would lead to vote rigging, but the line of remarks is something that officials of the Unity Party Alliance have been echoing in recent times, even though the Weah administration has denied such claims.
Amos Tweh, the Secretary-General of the opposition Unity Party at the press conference yesterday noted that Boakai’s remarks were being “misconstrued.”
He asserted that the Unity Party has faith in the electoral body but would speak up if any inconsistencies arose to ensure the protection of their votes.
Tweh then expressed concern about the increase in the number of eligible voters in certain counties, such as Grand Bassa, Margibi, and Montserrado, following the electoral body deduplication and verification exercise that removed ineligible and underage voters from the voter roll.
The “process,” according to Tweh, should have either decreased or maintained the number of voters, not increased it.
In response, the Chairperson of the electoral body noted that while Tweh’s concern is valid, they will respond in due time after conducting a review of the process.
She, however, did not state when the review will take place and communicated to the Unity Party who has for some time now been raising alarm of the result of deduplication, which was conducted about two months back.
Elsewhere, Lansanah has disclosed that the African Union (AU) has deployed two data management experts while sub-regional body ECOWAS is also expected to do so this week.
The experts who would be working with the NEC’s data team presence in the country were based, which Lansanah had made as part of a request to build confidence in the electoral process.
“These experts are deployed at the NEC Data Center to work with the NEC Data Center staff as a way of lending further credibility and transparency to the management and security of the electoral database.
“ECOWAS is also procuring some computers and printers for election results management as well as assisting with the Commission’s voter education and gender outreach efforts and logistics, including the purchase of four vehicles for rough terrain. The African Union is also hiring three vehicles for rough terrain,” Lansanah said.
Meanwhile, a little over 10 million ballot papers for the October 10 polls, according to Lansanah, have arrived in the country and will be distributed soon to various counties.
The papers, which are arriving just two weeks before the elections, have been categorized into presidential, senatorial, and representative categories.
Out of 10 million ballot papers, 3,320,500 have been put aside for presidential candidates, while 3,402,122 go for senatorial candidates and 3,403,208 for representative candidates.
“The ballots are currently in secure storage under the protection of state security. The deployment of ballot papers and other sensitive election materials to the 2,080 polling precincts nationwide will commence in the next few days,” Lansanah disclosed.
According to her, the electoral body is committed to ensuring that each part of the country’s 15 political sub-divisions with polling precincts receives their ballot papers on time for the smooth conduct of what she described as free, fair, and democratic elections.
“Assorted election materials, including ballot boxes, precinct kits, tactile ballot guides, indelible ink, and assorted stationery procured internationally have arrived in the country,” Lansanah noted. “Packaging of materials [for] polling places began about two weeks ago and is ongoing. Distribution of these materials to the various county warehouses will commence in the next few days.”
As for the Final Registration (voter) Roll, which is already grossly behind schedule, Lansanah claimed that the Commission’s employees are working very hard to print the roll, and make it readily available in time for the October 10 polls.
“NEC staff are working day and night to ensure that materials are deployed in time for the October 10 elections, especially given the challenges with delivery of those materials to some parts of the country.
“NEC reiterates that the FRR for the 2023 Presidential and Legislative Elections will be made available to all political parties, independent candidates, and other stakeholders upon completion of the ongoing process to secure the data,” she said.
Lansanah noted that to make the process more transparent, as has been done in the past, the voters’ roll will be pasted at all polling precincts across the country prior to Election Day.
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