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Weah claims fraud as Sirleaf takes early lead in presidential race in Liberia |
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 MONROVIA, 9 Nov 2005 (IRIN) - Former finance minister Ellen
Johnson-Sirleaf took an early lead on Wednesday in the race for the
Liberian presidency, as her soccer star rival George Weah said that the
run-off vote had not been free and fair.
With results in from
a third of polling stations across the West African nation, the
National Elections Commission said that Sirleaf had won 60.4 percent of
the ballots cast in Tuesday’s second-round vote and Weah had captured
39.6 percent.
As the first preliminary and partial votes were
being announced, the former AC Milan striker was declaring that the
ballot had been fixed.
“We’re preaching about transparency and democracy but in this case, I
found that the election was fraudulent. There were a lot of
irregularities,” he told reporters, holding up ballot papers that he
said had been pre-marked for his rival.
| Liberians keep themselves up to date on the latest goings-on in the race for the presidency
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“But while we are going through the investigation… I ask all of my partisans to be calm for the sake of peace,” he said.
Weah,
a high school dropout who made a name for himself on the football
pitches of Europe, has proved popular with young Liberians and he has
also won the support of many ex-combatants and their former rebel
leaders.
Some Liberians worry that these young men,
experiencing their first elections since the 14-year-old conflict
ended, may react badly if the man they call “King George” loses.
“If George says there’s cheating then we will back George,” said James Johnson, a 21-year-old cook.
Looking to observers
Aides
for Sirleaf -- who will be Africa’s first elected female president if
she maintains her lead – declined to comment on Weah’s allegations of
fraud.
“We were the players in this election. It’s the
international observers who are the referees and will make the judgment
on whether the ballot was free and fair,” Morris Dukuly, one of the
campaign team, told IRIN.
Speaking after the polls had closed
on Tuesday, Alan Doss, the head of the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL)
said he was pleased with what he had seen on election day.
“I witnessed a run-off election that was conducted in a peaceful and transparent manner,” he told reporters.
Some
of the 300 international observers, including the European Union and
the Carter Centre, are due to release their preliminary reports from
Thursday onwards.
Aside from the fraud allegations, Weah’s
campaign team has also accused Liberia’s electoral chief of bias
against him and demanded she step down.
| George Weah
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Frances
Johnson-Morris rebuked Weah in public on polling day for saying that he
had really won the first round of the ballot, held on 11 October, by a
big enough margin to make a run-off unnecessary.
“The
comments… are nothing less than a smear campaign against Ambassador
Weah intended to undermine his victory in the presidential elections,”
Weah’s Congress for Democratic Change party said in a statement.
Johnson-Morris rejected the accusations.
“I
have been more than impartial. I have played my role… as head of this
commission and I will continue to play my role,” she told a news
conference.
As the bickering unrolled in front of the world’s
media, some residents in the capital Monrovia, which is still without
running water and mains electricity more than two years after the war
ended, were clear about their priorities.
“All we want is peace,” said 37-year-old Beatrice Reeves.
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