The injunction placed on the Liberty Party by the 6th Judicial Circuit Civil Law Court restraining the party from holding its Special National Convention planned for Ganta City, Nimba County, has been lifted. With this latest development, the convention will now go on today, Saturday, December 18, 2021, the day it was originally scheduled to end.
Breaking the news last evening to the public during a special press conference held at the Mountain Dew Hotel, in Ganta, Liberty Party National Chairman, Musa Hassan Bility, said that the action was taken by the court after the legal team of the party had gone to court to challenge the injunction and successfully made its legal representation to convince the court to quash the stay order.
Mr. Bility said the convention experienced a setback earlier in the day when at about 7:30 on Friday Morning he was informed by the Vice Chairman for Operations that there was a letter from the court, and wanted to know whether he should accept it or not; and that he told his Vice Chairman for Operations that once the letter is from the court he should accept it because according to him the Law is the law and nothing should be done to obstruct the process.
He said upon receiving the information that the court was seeking a stay order on the special national convention, the party put together its legal team to approach the court to vacate the order so that the convention will go on as planned.
“I am pleased to inform you that another attempt by some people to thwart the will of the people has been successfully defeated. The civil law court has removed the injunction and the special national convention will now go on tomorrow. I want to thank all the partisans of the Liberty Party, the legal team and to assure them that the Liberty Party will play its role in 2023. We will not allow this role to be personalized by individuals who feel that they are entitled owners of this party. Tomorrow we will declare the Special Convention opened and we will exhaust all on the agenda”, Mr. Bility said.
He also thanked the National Elections Commission for being consistent with the law and its rules that will legally defend parties against acts to derail the democratic process, especially those who, according to him, read the constitution to their own understanding and advantage. He said those attempts will not stop the Liberty party from playing its role it should play in 2023.
He said the latest development will now remove the Liberty Party from the state of individualism to the state of collectivism.
Mr. Bility said the party will make major decisions at the convention and will legalize all the decisions through the constitution so that they will be legally binding on the party and all partisans. He said some of the decisions that will be formalized at the convention will be to legalize the decision the party took in March 2021 not to field any presidential candidate for 2023 election and the direction it should take with respect to who to support for the sole presidential ticket of the Collaborating Political Parties (CPP) during its ensuing presidential primary.
Responding to a question whether the delegates expected to attend the convention met the threshold to hold the event, Mr. Bility said as far as the delegates issue was concerned, they met the three segments for participation under the LP constitution. He said there are 31 members on the Executive Committee, out of which three members were not active, naming Madam Edith Gongloe-Weh who has not taken her seat, and Senator Darius Dillon and Daniel Sando who were all suspended recently thus bringing the number to 28 members. He said out of the 28, 18 persons were confirmed for participation.
“At the county level, we have 11 confirmed, representing two-third of the entire county delegation, they are all here and you can confirm that. For the National Advisory Council, assuming that there were no suspensions of those who feel entitled despite the fact that they cannot pay due, there are 10 persons because one person resigned. Out of the 10, 5 have been confirmed and under our laws, we suspended the rest. The eight segments that I have just named to you are the three components of those who constitute the threshold to hold convention. So you can judge for yourself. According to the Liberty Party constitution, we only need eight counties to be present and a majority of the delegates. We have super majority”, he said.
He also boasted that the party will not be the same again after the convention because it is going to be attractive to the citizens to the extent that there will be activities at the Headquarters of the party every Wednesdays and Saturdays of the week.
Speaking about partisan Emmanuel Azango who had filed the protest against the outcome of the January 2021 convention, Mr. Bility said it was an issue that he would speak less of it but what he would want to say was that Azango was created by Senator Nyonblee and her people because Azango contested at the convention but lost and Senator Nyonblee Karngar Lawrence used the constitution to induct the elected officers into their respective offices.
Yesterday, Friday, December 17, 2021, Emmanuel Azango again filed a complaint at the civil law court alleging that the convention that elected Mr. Bililty and other officials of the party and adopted the constitution was not properly executed according to the constitution of the party. It was based on his complaint that the civil law court placed a Preliminary Writ of Injunction on the party yesterday not to hold the convention, but with the court having reversed its stay order, the Liberty Party Special Convention remains on course.
This is a developing story. Updates will continue subsequently.
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