Businesswoman Vows to End Leadership Obstacle In Grd Ged -Declares To Contest Representative Seat In 2023

A herculean challenge to end the obstacles  eluding females from occupying leadership positions and participating in politics in Grand Gedeh County has been thrown out as the contest for elective positions against 2023 in the County heats up.

Speaking to The Analyst Newspaper in an exclusive interview from her residence in the United States  early Sunday Morning , February, 5, 2022, Mrs. Marie Johnson, a renowned businesswoman confirmed the story making the rounds of her decision to contest the representative seat of District #2, Grand Gedeh County to respond to the clarion calls of the people for a true representation in the national legislature as well as finding a rallying point to address the many challenges the district and its people have been plagued with.

“Yes, I have expressed my desire to contest for the representative position for District #2, Grand Gedeh County, after listening to numerous pleas from our people to fill in the void created by bad and poor representations over the years which have negatively impacted on the development of our district and its people. We know you will see challenges down the road as it relates to our aspiration, but we instead see opportunities; opportunities that we all as a people can leverage on if we decide this time around to shift the paradigm and make District #2 the focus for progress and not something that is anchored on the personal ambition of some people who have over the years kept our district and people down”, she said.

When asked why her aspiration is getting rave review from the gender perspective and not what she brings to the table, Mrs. Johnson, said the gender tag surrounding her ambition is the making of those who have been tied to the wrong insinuation that leadership is more of a gender thing than the ability of the individual to understand the real issues holding a group of people in the web of poverty and general backwardness and that until Grand Gedeans erase that negative thought, nothing positive will ever come their way.

“And you get to see these negative thoughts of some of our people all the time when a serious woman avails herself to serve her people. I am not playing the gender card and will not venture to even any of my supporters to go that route but it is fair enough to say that after 58 years of gaining a full county status, it is high time that our people place the county in the mainstream of national reality where women in other counties are playing major roles in the leadership equation of their respective counties, be it appointive or elective positions”

She noted that what is confronting Grand Gedeh County today, especially District #2, has nothing to do with gender preference for leadership but the fundamental flaws associated with wrong decisions during electoral cycles and that come 2023, the people must look and vote for the right person who has the right credentials. Passion, care and credibility to lead them out of the predicament the county finds itself.

Mrs. Johnson who is a well-known businesswoman with business interests both in the Liberia and United States , prominent among which are owning and running a health care and home service business in the US and a construction company which is presently involved in contractual services on roads and other infrastructures in River Gee and Maryland Counties, said that the whole problem facing the county and its people can be summed up in poverty, which she defined as income poverty and knowledge poverty.

“Poverty is eating deep in our people and we have to look at it from the income and human perspective. Income poverty has to do with our people lacking money because they do not have the means to make money while human poverty talks about the lack of skills, training, opportunities, education, etc that create income or money. Both of them are interwoven and we have to find ways to invest in agriculture, education, skills acquisition and empowerment as the surest ways to fight this poverty quagmire”, she said.

While responding to a question what has she done for her people that will attract their attention, the businesswoman turned politician said she does not normally talk about what she has been doing for her people, but the records are there in the district for others to see that her involvement in the lives of the people is not a fluke. However, background investigation done by this paper found out that she is the main force behind a private high school constructed in the district that is providing free and quality education to school going children and a boarding facility is about to be added.

Mrs. Johnson said she will be contesting as an independent candidate and not on the platform of any political party in order to allow her to have a free and independent thinking on what she wants to do and achieve for her people without being obstructed by any external obligation and imposition.