MONROVIA – The chairman of the opposition Liberty, Musa Hassan Bility has knockout the former political leader of the party Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence in a Supreme Court legal suit. The high court of the country recently handed its ruling in the case in favour of the Bility Team.
The court’s final ruling in the Petition for a Writ of Certiorari in the case Musa Hasan Bility and others of the Liberty Party (Appellees) v. National Elections Commission, Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence and Emmanuel Azango (Respondents), declaring the Liberty Party (LP) Constitution filed at the National Elections Commission (NEC) legal and the LP leadership duly elected and inducted at the January 2021 Party Special National Convention in Gbarnga legal.
Based on the Supreme Court ruling, Mr. Bility has maintained the expulsion of Madam Karnga-Lawrence.
In communications written to several local and International institutions, the Liberty Chairman informed them that Sen. Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence is no longer the Political Leader of Liberty Party (LP).
He disclosed that 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 further informed the institutions that the recent Supreme Court 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, Musa Bility said as per the LP Constitution, the tenure of Karnga-Lawrence as Political Leader of the party has expired in October 2022.
Mr. Bility, therefore, urged the institutions to refrain from conducting business pertaining to the party with anyone other than the National Executive Committee, under the leadership of Mr. Musa Hasan Bility.
He wrote the National Elections Commission, Africa Union (AU), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the United Nations (UN), the United States Embassy near Monrovia, the European Union in Liberia and all Foreign Diplomatic Mission in Liberia, etc.
The Liberty Party Chairman to the institutions that the National Executive Committee, under the leadership of the National Chairman, Mr. Musa Hasan Bility, is the only body authorized to manage the day-to-day affairs of the LP.
In a ‘pseudo’ and rather face-saving reaction, the defeated Karnga-Lawrence said it was “ Big Mistake to elect Bility as Chairman of the party in the fist place.
Senator Nyonblee Kanrnga-Lawrence claimed the opposition Liberty Party made a “big” blunder by electing business tycoon Musa Bility as party chairman a few years ago.
The Grand Bassa County Senator’s remarks come after a ruling from the Supreme Court in favor of Bility, whom she had accused of tampering with the party’s constitution.
The Senator, who in 2020 defended Bility’s election against public outcry, now claimed that the Musa Bility leadership has caused unwarranted confusion and chaos in the party after.
“Bility’s election to the position as a Party Chairman is now considered one of the biggest mistakes that was ever made,” Karnga-Lawrence said in an address to partisans in Grand Bassa County.
“We submit that indeed a mistake that makes you humble is better than an achievement that makes you arrogant.
“As the Leader of our beloved party, I stand here today, humbled, and sad and want to say sorry; sorry for putting you all through all this trauma, frustration and sleepless nights. I take all the responsibility. We have had sleepless nights as a team strategizing, blaming one another at some point, and even shutting down for days to reflect.”
However, Karnga-Lawrence seems prepared for a prolonged battle as she does not intend to abandon the battle to take back the Liberty Party — aiming at announcing the next course of next legal action on April 18.
According to the Bassa Senator, the fight for the party is not against Bility but to ensure that the party leads the base that will influence the 2023 elections.
The Grand Bassa Senator who is eying the vice presidential candidate slot of the opposition Unity Party, is not willing to let go of the country’s third biggest opposition political party, as doing so would leave her without any basis.
“We all have fought the hardest, we all have stood together, and we all have supported the process in many ways. We are not discouraged and we are not tired fighting because we know that we are on the right side.
