The Board of Commissioners of the National Elections Commission (NEC) has ordered its Certification Committee, under the Political Affairs Section, to officially arrange and work out all modalities for the certification Ceremony of the winners of the December 8, 2020 special senatorial elections in Lofa and Maryland counties.
The Board of Commissioners of NEC took the decision on Tuesday, March 2, 2021, following the reading of the mandate of the Supreme Court of Liberia. The mandate of the Supreme Court, among other things, confirmed the ruling of the Board of Commissioners, declaring J. Browne Samukai winner of the December 8, 2020 special senatorial election in Lofa County.
The mandate of the Supreme Court, signed by its Clerk, Sam Momolu, also instructed the National Elections Commission (NEC) to resume jurisdiction of the Lofa County appeal case of election irregularities. The case grew out of the action of election irregularities filed by Ahmed and James as first complainants and Kesselly and Peter as second complainants, all of Lofa County. But the highest court in the nation said they had no standing to challenge the results as they were not political parties and candidates.
The Chairperson of the Board, Davidetta Browne Lansanah, said having resumed jurisdiction of the matter, the Certification Committee, led by the Political Affairs Office, is instructed to work out all modalities of the time and date for certification of J. Browne Samukai as Senator of Lofa County, and suspended the matter.
Chairman Browne-Lansanah, in the ruling, said after the complainant listened to the soundness of the motion to dismiss and interposed no objection to the motion to dismiss, the Administrative Court granted the motion to dismiss as prayed for by the complainant. The Chairperson then suspended the Lofa and Maryland counties election dispute cases as a matter of law.
When the Maryland case was called for hearing on Tuesday, March 2, 2021 on a motion to dismiss an appeal, lawyers representing Senator H. Dan Marias, led by Cllr. Wilfred Sayeh, after representations by the complainant and respondent, first made a submission and informed the Administrative Court that they interposed no objection to the motion to dismiss the appeal and expressed no interest to continue the case filed against James Biney, winner of the December 8, 2020 special senatorial elections in Maryland County.
The NEC decision comes a day after the Minister of Justice, Cllr. Frank Musah Dean, officially wrote the election body reminding them of the affirmation of the judgment of guilt by the Supreme Court against the Senator-elect of Lofa County, J. Brownie Samukai.
“We present our compliments and, consistent with Section 3.23 of the New Elections Law, herewith inform you of the attached final judgment of the Honorable Supreme Court of Liberia, affirming the judgment of guilt against Messrs. J. Brownie Samukai, Joseph J. Johnson and Nyumah Dorkor, for the commission of the crimes of theft of property, misuse of public money and criminal conspiracy,” Minister Dean’s letter read.
It continued, “May we inform you, it is the law extant in our jurisdiction that any person convicted of a felony, committed in connection with his employment as a public servant, is disqualified from holding public office until the sentence is served and/or the satisfaction of any other penalty imposed. For reliance, please see Penal Law, 41CLR, title 26, Section 50.12(b) (1976), and 1986 Constitution of Liberia, Article 21 (j).”
However, the NEC seems adamant on implementing the mandate of the Supreme Court’s ruling to certificate Samukai, as his election was conducted through a free and fair democracy.
When the Hot Pepper contacted the Solicitor General of the Republic of Liberia, Cllr. Sayma Serenius Cephus, about the matter he promised to call the paper back as he was in a meeting, but up to press time his call was not forthcoming.