Liberian Presidential Polls 2005: A Victory for All!

Centre for Democracy & Development (CDD) wishes to commend the people of Liberia for the courage and bold resolve they have demonstrated, through their huge and impressive turnouts during the 11 October 2005 general elections and the 8 November 2005 presidential runoff elections, to break away from a history of conflict, internecine wars, displacements, chronic poverty and under-development. While the Liberian Presidential Runoff Election initially created certain degrees of disaffection among particular constituencies who complained of some untoward practices in the polling, the election has been generally declared, by several national and international observers, multi-lateral organisations and institutions across the world, to have been one of the freest and fairest in the history of the country. It represents a significant victory for all the citizens of the country and stakeholders in the cohesion of the West African sub-region. With the tallying of election results across the 15 counties and 3070 polling precincts across Liberia confirming Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of the Unity Party’s position as the President-in-Waiting in the country, after garnering over 59% of the total number of votes cast as against the 41% cast for her opponent, George Weah of the Congress for Democratic Change, this presents a victory for women on the continent. The singularity of this incidence, not only gives Africa its first elected female head of government, but equally prises open the lid of opportunity for the women folk to be able make all the difference that they are capable of in governance, on the continent.

The rising of a new dawn in Liberia definitely symbolises a triumph over the cycles of plunder and carnage that have embroiled the country in the past two-and-a-half decades, and occasioned intermittent escalations of violence that culminated in some three full-blown civil wars, which decimated over 250,000 Liberians. These conflicts pushed Liberia to the precipice and left it deeply scarred and factionalised. As such, with the return of democracy to Liberia, there is the resuscitation of the hope of securing a space for reconciliation and rehabilitation in the country. And, alongside the need for the healing up of the deeply war-traumatised psyche of the people, there is the necessity for the rehabilitation of the human rights of Liberians, the building of bridges across fragmented divides, and the cultivation of a common citizenship that is strongly linked to the forging of a common destiny. Even then challenges abound with the urgency required for the re-building of the country, its physical and political infrastructure, and institutions.

Significantly, the return to democracy in post-civil war Liberia also constitutes a regional victory, as it denotes the routing of some of the most potent sources of instability in West Africa, as seemingly national conflicts have tended to assume regional dimensions, as particularly revealed in many of the conflicts that swept across countries along the Mano River. Hence, it is imperative for the incoming president-elect, Mrs. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and her administration to reach out to all the stake-holders, factions and divides in Liberian society, and bring them together into an all-inclusive government, to which they all feel a sense of ownership. This should comprise one of the cardinal points of reconciliation in the country. More so, this is quite important, due to the very fragile nature of the peace that is still in existence in the country, with the evidences of the arms stowaways in remote counties, despite the disarmament exercises of the United Nations Mission In Liberia (UNMIL).

The successfully held run-off election in Liberia, in addition, is testament of one of the more recent victories of the (inter-)national community: local and international institutions, NGOs, bi-lateral, multi-lateral and developmental agencies - ECOWAS, UNMIL, EU, the global civil society - who have painstakingly committed their time and resources into drawing Liberia out of the decay it had sunk into within the African region. Of particular note is the role played by ECOWAS, which strove over the years to preserve peace in the country through the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) and has also laboured to consolidate the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that led to the formulation of the National Transitional Government of Liberia, which drove and managed the process that has culminated in the present state of affairs in the country.