MONROVIA – The passage of the Threshold Bill by the Liberian House of Representatives has sparked controversy, with one of them, Representative Musa Hassan Bility, leading the charge against it. The bill has been widely condemned, and Bility sees it self-serving attempt to expand the Legislature’s size, disregarding the country’s pressing economic and social challenges. At the heart of Rep. Bility’s criticism is the concern that the bill prioritizes politicians’ interests over those of the Liberian people, who are struggling to access basic necessities like healthcare, education, and jobs. By adding more seats to the Legislature without addressing the country’s pressing issues, the bill sends a tone-deaf message that the political class is more interested in expanding its own ranks than serving the people. As The Analyst reports, Rep. Bility is urging citizens, civil society, and the Supreme Court to scrutinize the bill and uphold the Constitution’s integrity.
Nimba County Representative Musa Bility has raised a strong voice against the hurried passed “threshold bill” creating additional constituencies in the country, describing it a “constitutional deviation” and a “moral and economic provocation” that prioritizes the interests of politicians over those of the Liberian people.
“The decision of the House to add more seats for politicians, when the present seats have produced no meaningful dividend for the people, is an act of insensitivity,” Rep. Bility said in the statement issued yesterday.
He argues that the bill undermines the integrity of elections and creates inequality in representation, and calls on the Senate to refuse concurrence and the Supreme Court to examine the bill’s constitutionality.
“Liberia does not belong to this generation alone. It belongs as well to the children who are yet unborn. We betray them when we bend the rules for our own advantage,” the Political Leader of the Citizens Movement for Change (CMC) said.
He asserted: “Today I speak as one of the many servants of the Liberian people and as a member of the House of Representatives, deeply troubled by the recent passage of the so called Threshold Bill. It is framed as a technical threshold instrument. In truth it raises serious questions under our Constitution and creates a social, economic and political distortion that our country cannot afford. The Liberian Constitution is clear. It is the supreme and fundamental law of the Republic. Every public official, from the President to the least appointed officer, is bound by it. When any act of the Legislature departs from the Constitution, that act is void to the extent of the inconsistency, and it is the Supreme Court that is charged with the sacred duty to say so. When the House abandons constitutional discipline, the people are left with only two shields, their voice and their Court.”
Making further arguments against the House’s move, Bility stressed: “The stated subject of this bill is the setting of the population threshold for electoral districts after the national census. The Constitution authorizes the Legislature to prescribe the number of citizens that should form a constituency. It ties that authority to actual population figures and to the principle that constituencies must have as close to equal population as possible. It also vests the National Elections Commission with the task of using that threshold and the census to reapportion constituencies before every set of elections.
“The logic is simple. The Legislature sets a neutral rule built on numbers and fairness. The Elections Commission applies that rule in a technical manner so that each Liberian voter has roughly the same weight in the choice of members of the House. The people are supposed to choose their representatives inside a framework that is rational, equal and predictable, not in a field distorted by political bargaining for more seats.”
According to the Bility, the Threshold Bill departs from this design, because instead of simply adjusting the threshold to reflect Liberia’s population reality and leaving the present number of seats in place for the Elections Commission to fairly reassign, the bill presses for more seats.
“It uses the language of threshold, but the real effect is expansion of the Legislature. The result is not better equality in representation. It is more chairs in an institution that has already failed to prove its value to the ordinary citizen,” he said rather poignantly. “This is not only a constitutional deviation. It is a moral and economic provocation.”
Bility emphasized that Liberia is facing a deep social and economic crisis.
“Our people are struggling to pay school fees, to find medical care, to afford food and transport. Public hospitals lack the most basic supplies,” he continued. “Classrooms are overcrowded. Young people are roaming the streets without jobs and without hope. At the same time, the cost of government is already consuming a very large share of the national budget, with little visible return for the people who fund it.”
Adding, Bility posited: “In this context, the decision of the House to add more seats for politicians, when the present seats have produced no meaningful dividend for the people, is an act of insensitivity. It sends a painful message that, in the face of hunger and hardship, the priority of the Legislature is to expand its own space rather than reduce its burden on the taxpayer. It is difficult to defend such a choice under the constitutional duty to manage national resources in the interest of the general welfare.”
He also said the bill deepens a political disease that already infects our system. “Instead of treating representation as a sacred trust, it encourages a scramble for more positions. It invites political actors to fight over new districts when the representatives in the existing districts have not delivered roads, schools, clinics or justice for their people.
“It converts the idea of a population threshold into a tool for patronage. It teaches the wrong lesson, that when the public is dissatisfied with the performance of officials, the answer is to create more officials rather than to demand better performance or to reform the system.”
By departing from the constitutional model, Bility continued, “the bill undermines the integrity of elections themselves. If the Legislature can, in effect, script the number and shape of seats to suit present political interests, the promise of equal representation becomes an illusion. Voters in some areas will continue to carry a heavier load than others.
“The value of a vote will depend on where a citizen lives, not on the equal dignity the Constitution promises to every Liberian. This erodes trust in the democratic process and invites resentment between counties, communities and parties.”
He also indicated that there is also a generational injustice buried in this law, for the the Constitution imposes limits on the size of the House for a reason.
“It is a reminder that the Republic does not belong only to those who hold power today. It belongs to those who will come after us. Space within the constitutional ceiling should be preserved for future generations, who may need to make adjustments in a different social and economic context. To rush and consume that space now, for the comfort of the present political class, is to mortgage the future of our children for the short term advantage of a few.”
Concluding, the Nimba County lawmaker said: “The Liberian people are watching. Many may not know the exact article numbers, the legal language, or the internal procedures of the House, but they understand when their leaders put themselves first and the country last. They understand when the Constitution is treated as a suggestion instead of a command. They understand when the rules are bent so that those already seated in power can pull more chairs into the room.
“For these reasons, I raise these concerns in language that the Supreme Court can understand as well as the ordinary citizen. I want our people to know that some of us within the Legislature do not consent to this course. We believe that respect for the Constitution is not a choice. It is a duty. We believe that at a time of hardship, government must show restraint, not self-expansion. We believe that representation is measured by service and impact, not by the number of seats and titles.”