The Head of State declared that he wanted to run for a second consecutive term during the speech he is required to issue by the Constitution each year before the Parliament.
MO12345lemonde with AFP
The president of Liberia George Weah announced on Monday January 30 that he would seek a second consecutive term at the head of this English -speaking country in West Africa during the election scheduled for October. “My dear fellow citizens, I will come to ask you shortly to renew (…) for the second time the mandate you granted me six years ago,” said the former glory of football in a big tumult Appromer at the end of the annual and solemn speech on the country’s situation.
m. Weah, 56, promised a second “mandate rich in opportunities, a mandate for transformation, a mandate for development”, but also for “consolidation” of the achievements.
In this speech that he is required to deliver by the Constitution each year before the rooms of the Parliament, Mr. Weah defended his record. “Let me ensure that our nation is strong, our nation is stable, our nation is full of life (…), our nation is in peace and security and we hear it remains”, he specified.
m. Weah, the only sub -Saharan Ballon d’Or to date, converted into politics after the end of his sports career, was elected in the second round of the presidential election in December 2017 and took office in January of the following year.
very few promises
His victory aroused immense hopes in a country ravaged by civil wars which left 250,000 dead from 1989 to 2003. And bruised at the end of a period 2014-2016 marked by an EBOLA fever epidemic which has killed more than 4,800 Liberians.
The country of some five million inhabitants recovered in Grand-Péine when it was tested by the Pandemic of Covid-19 then by the consequences of the war in Ukraine. About half of Liberians live with less than $ 1.90 per day, according to the World Bank.
The former star of the Milan AC and PSG football accessed the presidency by promising to create jobs and invest in education. Many poor people adulated the former kid of slums who became a planetary star, then head of state.
His detractors criticize Mr. Weah for having kept very little of his promises. They accuse him of being disconnected from the realities of his fellow citizens who struggle between prices increase and shortage of products such as fuel and basic services, in one of the least developed countries in the world.
Corruption deemed endemic
He remains in the suspicion of not being in his place at the head of the State. Recently, he was attacked for his prolonged absence outside the country, around forty days spent from conferences in the summary, but also at the Football World Cup in Qatar where his son defended the colors of the United States.
The presidency invoked the merits of these trips in the national interest. It also commonly evokes the heaviness of the inheritance received by Mr. Weah. The opposition attributes to the Head of State the persistence of a corruption deemed endemic that he had committed to fighting. He is in this regard under the pressure of the great American ally. Washington has sanctioned five senior Liberal officials for alleged corruption in three years.
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The victims of civil wars are still waiting for Mr. Weah to act for atrocities responsible for accounts. The calls regularly launched in favor of the creation of a court of war crimes in Liberia, where certain former warlords remain powerful, have so far remained a dead letter.