Photo credit to DOSSO / AFP.
George Weah, the soccer superstar-turned-politician, is back.
Weah, who narrowly lost a runoff in Liberia’s 2005 presidential election to Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, returned to the heart of Liberian politics by winning a seat in Liberia’s 30-member Senate. Half of the Senate’s seats were up for election in the December 20 elections.
In results announced earlier this week, Weah overwhelmingly defeated Robert Sirleaf, the president’s son, by a staggering margin of 78% to 11% in Montserrado County, the most populous of Liberia’s counties and home to the Liberian capital of Monrovia.
In all, Johnson Sirleaf’s Unity Party won just four of the 15 seats in the elections, which also saw the reelection of Prince Johnson, a former rebel leader who launched attacks against former president Samuel Doe in 1990 and Jewel Howard Taylor, the ex-wife of Charles Taylor, who has been convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court.
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There are three clear narratives about the Senate elections worth heeding. Continue reading Liberia’s opposition just had a great Senate election