UP’s Unending Quest to Capture Speakership at All Cost -CDC Deplores “Abortive Attempt to Criminally Manipulate” Lawmakers

MONROVIA – The Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) has joined other like-minded forces to deplore what it described “the abortive attempt by the Unity Party administration of President Joseph Nyuma Boakai to criminally manipulate members of the House of Representatives into ousting House Speaker J Fonati Koffa.”

The CDC recalled that this is the third abortive orchestration aimed at removing Speaker Koffa since the UP lost the bid for Speakership in January 2024.

“We vehemently and vociferously condemn the Unity Party’s abuse of public resources to bribe lawmakers into instigating a legislative coup against the Speaker,” the party said in a release signed by its Acting Chairperson Janga Kowo.

The release quotes the CDC as observing “the Unity Party’s unending quest to capture the Speakership at all and any cost, something that “betrays its abhorrence of the critical democratic balance now existing at the legislature,” wherein the ruling party heads the Senate and an opposition party leads the House of Representatives.

The CDC noted that such a balance is an established feature in mature democracies and henceforth must be ensconced and maintained in the realm of legislative politics if the county is to pursue and achieve important public interests goals germane to the fight against corruption, infrastructure transformation and serious improvements in the quality of health and education, in the quality of public service delivery and in the quality of living standard.

“At a time of extreme economic hardship where tens of thousands of Liberians do not have money to even enroll their children since the commencement of school in September, where the UP Government is itself struggling to pay Government workers on time, and where the Government has been unable to make payments for goods and services to Government ministries and agencies,” the CDC said, “it is at best a flagrant disregard and disrespect for public outrage against corruption and at worst a criminal conspiracy worthy of serious investigation by the Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission and the Ministry of Justice.”

The CDC called on all members of the national opposition community to support its call to rally to the defense of Speaker Koffa and jettison this dangerous and pernicious age-old habit of unjustly removing legislative leaders for reasons and motives unrelated to the pursuit of public good but founded in the cesspool of greed and corruption harnessed by selfish political actors in high places.

As members of Liberia’s opposition sworn to uphold the public trust by keeping the Government’s feet to the fire, the party said, the surest way of upholding such public trust is to maintain legislative parity in the crafting of the National Budget and the oversight of budget execution.

“Liberians in 2023 voted for this outcome by ensuring the ruling party does not have the numerical advantage to control both Houses in the legislature,” the CDC further noted. “Let us not as members of the opposition community countenance the illicit age-old and die-hard practice of exerting the influence of the ‘imperial presidency’ to subvert the electoral wishes of our people for legislative equilibrium by illegally wasting public money on lawmakers.”

“This moment requires our collective outrage!” the country’s biggest opposition party and former ruling administration said.

“To lawmakers of the Coalition for Democratic Change whose signatures were seen on what is being described as ‘a resolution to unseat the Speaker,’” the party said, “we call on you to submit to the mandate of the party and the wishes of our partisans to stand with the Speaker.

To the extent there are differences and divergences of viewpoints or perspectives impugning on the supposed actions or behavior of the speaker or on his performance, the party further asserted, “we must repair internal institutional mechanisms of the CDC legislative Caucus and the National Executive Committee to address such matters”.

To address the grave national concerns, the party announced convening a major meeting tomorrow Monday at noon at the headquarters of the CDC.

“All elected representatives of the CDC are asked to be in attendance, both those who may have signed the bogus resolution and those who did not sign,” the CDC declared. “All representatives who may not have run on the party ticket but who consider themselves members of the CDC are also asked to attend. All members of the CDC legislative Caucus in the Senate will also join the meeting.”

The party warned that members of its caucus in the House of Representatives who would fail to heed the public call by their failure to attend would therefrom be publicly disavowing their membership with the CDC Legislative Caucus and by extension with the CDC.

“The CDC, through its National Executive Committee, will subsequently take cognizance of this public disavowal,” said the release further.

“The CDC calls on all Cdcians and Liberians to work together to build and strengthen the CDC, to uphold the pluralism of our legislative democracy, to maintain the integrity of our public finances and to eventually transform our country.”