The Liberia Elections Observation Network (LEON) has issued its first statement on the conduct of Tuesday’s special senatorial and by-elections.
The group said it has observers at 700 polling places that have been randomly selected according to population distribution and in remote as well as urban and rural areas. This report is based on the checklists received so far by 258 observers who monitored voting and closing, it said.
In its press conference on Election Day LEON reported on several problems with people missing from the voters list in many places, trucking of voters and incidents of coercion and campaigning.
Sadly, these types of incidents continued throughout Election Day. More trucking was seen in Grand Bassa district 5 Precinct 09009 and in Bong County, District 2. Observers noted voters with valid voters’ cards not being found on the FRR at 47% of polling places observed, with 13 polling places having more than 10% of people not found.
Women’s TV-Liberia reported that around 100 voters threatened to disrupt election activities in Gbarnga, Bong county, T. Gray High School (precinct 06155) and N V Massaquoi High school (precinct 06158) due to their names not appearing on the FRR even though they have valid voter cards from 2017. They claimed that they verified their names were on the voters roll during the voters roll update exercise.
LEON observers reported on two arrests in Montserrado of people with more than one voter registration card – at St Edwards Catholic High School and at Messiah school in Morrison Farm Community. Spoon TV also posted film on Facebook of two people being arrested on 19th Street Sinkor, Montserrado District 9, with multiple voter cards, after having been spotted by reporters distributing them to people in the community. LEON is seriously concerned as to how these people got hold of all these voter cards.
LEON observers noted voters voting more than once or for other people in six polling places.
Voters were observed taking photos of their marked ballots behind the voting screens in fifteen polling places observed. Examples are in Montserrado Mango Town District 17, precinct 30205; the YMCA Crown Hill, District 8; Grand Bassa Owens Grove, Precinct 09012 polling place #5. The Presiding officers in the two Montserrado places insisted that the photos were deleted, and the police questioned the voter in grand Bassa who admitted that he had been offered money by one of the candidates to be paid when he showed the photo of the marked ballot, it said in the statement.
The group said there was an incident between CDC and CPP polling agents at Mavii Soni School, in district 14 Montserrado due to the CDC candidate having water bags in the polling place printed with Thomas Fallah’s photo. The polling agents received a warning.
CDC and CPP party agents were seen in almost polling places but were observed interfering in the polling process in 16 polling places. Independent candidates and Rainbow coalition also had a good number of agents in counties where they had candidates Overall, interference by party agents, party leaders of local government officials was witnessed in 15% of polling places observed, which is high and concerning.
LEONs Recommendations
LEON calls on the Liberia National Police to speedily investigate all those arrested for alleged electoral malpractices
“We call on the NEC to investigate how people came to be in possession of multiple voters’ cards in order to build voters’ confidence in future elections; LEON urged the NEC during tallying to be vigilant on any result suspected to have been tempered with,” it said.
LEON asks the LNP to beef up security in areas where tensions have been reported to protect election workers and results being transported to tally centers.
About LEON
The Liberia Elections Observation Network (LEON), launched in May 2017 is a platform of four Liberian Civil Society Organizations: The Catholic Justice and Peace Commission (JPC), Liberia Crusaders for Peace (LCP), Federation of Liberia Youth (FLY) and National Union of Organizations for the Disabled (NUOD) with the goal to meaningfully contribute to democratization processes in Liberia.
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