African Integrity Magazine – MRS. ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF LEADS IN LIBERIA’S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

MRS. ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF LEADS IN LIBERIA’S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

Oct 22, 2011 Samuel Africa News 0

The voters counted put President Ellen Johnson Sir-Leaf on 45.4 percent of the vote while her nearest rival, Wilson Tubman polled 29.5 percent and former Warlord Prince Johnson on 11.4 percent. Eight opposition parties in Liberia pulled out the Presidential Election which they call flawed.

They include the candidates who finished in second and third place. An opposition sources was quoted as saying “we are pulling out the process because it is not democratic and there is a lot of fraud”.

This is the first Election organized by Liberia’s National Elections commission after her 14 years old civil war, the previous was run by the UN.

The new election law approved on September 29, 1986 but amended on January 29, 2003 and December 23, 2004. It was on the basis of this Amended Electoral Law that the first post-civil war general Election took place in 2005 and that Mr. Ellen Johnson Sir-Leaf was Elected, not just as President of Liberia, but as Africa first female President.

The 2011 Presidential Election in Liberia is particularly interesting from one perspective. Liberia, as an Africa’s oldest republic should not, after more than one century of sovereign existence, is treated as a political neophyte, requiring international election monitors to assist in the determination of fairness, and extent of freedom of choice during election. After more than 160 years of non-colonization and self-rule, Liberia ought to be the political guide to other West African countries.

8,000 UN peace-keepers were deployed across Liberian, helping the election to unfold in a quiet atmosphere. Just recently, 2011 Nobel Prize was awarded to Ellen Johnson Sir-Leaf and other two Liberian Gbowee and Tawakkul Karman of Yemen for their work on women’s right.

The Norwegian Nobel committee honoured the three women “for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s right to full participation in peace building work”.

Johnson Sir-Leaf ran second to warlord-turned President Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate though she lost by a Landslide, she rose to National Prominence and earned the Nickname “IRON LADY”