Monrovia — Liberia’s Finance Minister Samuel D. Tweah, Jr. has dispelled rumors of him resigning from his position due to differences with the President after he reportedly refused to provide US$200,000 for the just-ended cabinet retreat in Buchanan, Grand Bassa County.
There were speculations by some news media outlets and on social media that upon the President’s request, the Finance Minister informed the President there was no money for such extravagant spending, especially when thousands of workers in several ministries and agencies were yet to receive their salaries for the past two months.
FrontPageAfrica gathered that Min. Tweah was in Abuja, Nigeria attending an African Development Bank meeting while the cabinet retreat was ongoing in Buchanan. However, his absence raised the eyebrows of many who were not aware of his mission in Abuja.
Reacting to the rumor, Mr. Tweah said, “The reports and rumors about my resignation as Minister of Finance and Development Planning are just bogus. These are the gimmicks and lies I have confronted as a minister since 2018,” Minister Tweah said.
Continuing, he added: “I do not understand why my detractors would say things about me that I do not do or have no inclination or propensity to do. Except the President seeks my resignation or chooses to terminate my tenure as a minister, I will remain eternally loyal to his administration as a founding ideologue of the CDC!!
“Misleading and fake news is on the rise, especially in this season when Liberians will make a choice about who will govern them for the next six years. The opposition community knows that President Weah is poised to win another term, and they have started to get jittery.”
Min. Tweah is regarded by many both in and out of the government to be one of the closest advisors and confidantes of Pres. Weah, therefore, his absence from any major retreat would trigger perceptions.
In 2019, there were rumors of Min. Tweah was asked by Pres. Weah to resign from his position. The rumor of his resignation at the time followed two leaked communications
That suggested that the Coalition for Democratic Change-led government had been dipping into donor funds at the Central Bank of Liberia.
However, the minister debunked the reports and insisted that he was still in charge of the country’s economic management team.
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