By Olando Testimony Zeongar
BUCHANAN, GRAND BASSA – Grand Bassa County Senator Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence, the embattled Political Leader of the crisis prone opposition Liberty Party (LP), has termed as a recipe for chaos, the recent ruling of the Supreme Court regarding the long-running leadership fracas within the LP.
Following a prolonged legal battle arising out of leadership squabble between two factions within Liberty Party headed by Musa Bility and Senator Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence respectively, the Supreme Court recently ruled, validating the Musa Bility’s faction as the legitimate leadership of the LP.
Immediately after the Court’s ruling, Bility, in a communication, reaffirmed a previous decision announcing the expulsion of Senator Karnga-Lawrence as Political Leader of the LP, and ordered that members of the public including politicians and political institutions refrain from conducting business pertaining to LP with the Bassa senator, nor anyone other than the Liberty Party’s National Executive Committee under his (Bility’s) leadership, as chairman of the Party.
“Also, we kindly inform you that Sen. Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence is no longer the Political Leader of Liberty Party (LP). Sen. Karnga-Lawrence was expelled from the position of Political Leader in March 2022 and appealed to the Court to invalidate the expulsion on the basis that the LP National Executive Committee did not have the authority to expel her because the LP 2021 Special National Convention that voted the National Executive Committee into leadership and the Constitution that came out of that Special National Convention were both illegitimate,” Bility wrote.
Bility, in his communication, added, “The recent SC Ruling has explicitly addressed both matters by declaring that both the LP 2021 Special National Convention and the resulting Constitution are legitimate and that the LP National Executive Committee is, constitutionally, clothed with the authority to manage the affairs of the Party. Additionally, as per the LP Constitution, her tenure as Political Leader has expired in October 2022.
We ask, therefore, that you please refrain from conducting business pertaining to LP with anyone other than the National Executive Committee, under the leadership of Mr. Musa Hassan Bility.”
Howbeit, in response to all of the foregoing, Senator Karnga-Lawrence, at Liberty Party Headquarters, in Buchanan City, Grand Bassa County, last weekend, addressed partisans and supporters of her LP faction, with the Bassa senator terming same as recipe for chaos and disturbances in Liberia.
She alleged that in its latest actions, the Supreme Court didn’t address what was before it, citing the representation of the Associate Justice who, she said had earlier recused himself at the hearing and his signature to the Court’s recent ruling, as well as what she described as the delay in presenting final judgement in the LP leadership feud.
“We are here today because all of these facts are troubling news for our country,” said Karnga-Lawrence, who stated that “When the NEC cannot act independently or without undue influence, and the courts cannot act on what’s before them out of fear that justice will jeopardize selfish political aims and objectives of agents and their benefactors that they favor.”
According to Senator Karnga-Lawrence, all of these actions are recipe for chaos and disturbances in a country that needs to focus its attention on good governance and peace building mission.
“My fellow partisans and Liberians in Liberia and all over the world, we are very concerned about how to affect change in such a system for the redemption of this country even more than how to find a logical conclusion to the Liberty Party matter,” she added.
She averred that to do so, Liberians can not fall in what she referred to as the trap of the delay tactics that is intended to keep their focus away from the October 10 2023 general and presidential elections.
She expressed gratitude, while bragging that even in the midst of what she termed as distractions, she remains in control of Liberty Party’s base, which she ranks as the second largest opposition constituency in Liberian politics.
“Therefore, we are here to announce to our partisans, after several consultative meetings with all the relevant structures including the diaspora chapters, stakeholders and advisors. That we will not abandon the legal battle, and our next legal action will be announced on Tuesday,” she disclosed – but as at the time of this publication, Smart News Liberia had reliably learnt that the embattled LP political leader was yet to announce her next legal action, as was stated by her.
However, she further told the Buchanan gathering that she’s ready to get up and get energized and position herself to collaborate with the political institution that will make the decisions that are in line with the values and beliefs that she continues to stand for and redeem Liberia.
“We remain the influencer in the 2023 general and presidential elections and in few days we will roll up ourselves and use our political capital and all resources available to us to decide who the next president to rescue this country becomes,” Karnga-Lawrence bragged, stating, “The well-being of our people matter to us!”
