George Weah is regarded as the best African player ever to have laced his boots
On a lazy Sunday afternoon in 1995, George Ousman Oppong Weah set off on a lanky, dribbling run to score against Italian football side Verona what to date remains one of the most astonishing goals in club football. Few would have foreseen his subsequent political career would adopt the same kind of twists and turns. For a man who regularly gobbled up opposing defenders for breakfast and got as much as he gave, his recent loss of the leadership of the political party he founded to propel him to the Liberian presidency was enough to reduce him to tears.
"I accept this defeat with a heavy heart,” he told his Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) party convention early this month. "The CDC is my greatest job, but politics is not like arithmetic.”Weah polled 111 votes against Winston Tubman's 118. Winston is a nephew of Liberia’s mercurial 19th president, William Tubman, who is widely regarded as the man who shaped the country’s modern history
Few anticipated the loss, given the the a background where the storied footballer had comprehensively beaten Tubman - indeed all other candidates - in the first round of the 2005 General Election Weah, who is one of Liberia’s most famous sons, would a month later lose the resulting run-off to incumbent Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf. She was running on a Unity Party (UP) ticket and became Africa’s first democratically-elected female President.
Lack of 'papers'
Weah will be Tubman’s running mate this time around, but the outcome again held up his lack of experience, despite the name recognition he holds and his wide appeal to the proletariat. Liberia holds its general election later this year in October. Weah’s 2005 loss was mainly attributed to his lack of education and experience, with voters opting for the Harvard-educated Johnson-Sirleaf when presented with the two candidates in the final round.
Johnson-Sirleaf’s work experience was also a trump card; the 72-year-old had back in 1979 served as finance minister under President William Tolbert, followed later by prestigious stints in the World Bank and the United Nations secretariat.
Weah’s credentials were mainly of the footballing kind, and while loudly protesting that those with "papers" had in decades not “achieved anything” for Liberia, he duly went to the United States after his loss in search of them. He now holds a Masters in Public Administration and a Bachelors degree in Management. The convention defeat places him in the awkward situation of deputising a man whom he clearly trumps in the popularity contest.
But then, concerns were rife at the convention that Weah’s lack of experience would again be shown up by the accomplished Johnson-Sirleaf. The party's new standard-bearer is now a better match for Johnson-Sirleaf.
Tubman, a lawyer and experienced diplomat of Americo-Liberian descent, holds degrees from Harvard, Cambridge University and the London School of Economics, in addition to wide experience at the UN. The 70- year-old, who traces his roots to the settler True Whig Party, seems the clear winner having bagged Weah, who had himself wooed the Liberty Party’s Charles Walter Brumskine, before leaving him in the lurch..
“Winston Tubman has got the deal he wanted and is ready to make a push during this election. He is educated and savvy; but does not have the charisma and personality to be taken seriously. Weah brings name recognition plus grassroots appeal to the race,” said Liberian analyst Ralph Geeplay, writing for the independent web magazine The Liberian Dialogue.
“Tubman also knows the alleys and backdoors of Liberian politics and if he wins the presidency, Weah could learn a thing or two from an old hand,” added Geeplay.
Fluid scene
Analysts are still divided as to the potency of the CDC ticket, with Johnson-Sirleaf, who calls herself “formidable”, clearly the candidate to beat. Tubman and Ambassador Weah, as the former footballer is affectionately called, will be up against a decorated woman who has been at the forefront of Liberia’s post-conflict effort to rebuild the country's rich heritage.
"For the CDC ticket to win, it will have to rally the entire Liberian political opposition behind it, [and]that's going to be difficult," Geeplay told the Africa Review.
Johnson-Sirleaf also holds an enviable economic record; in her first term she almost wiped out Liberia's debt, and has attracted billions of dollars worth of investment to the economy.
She is also credited with revamping Liberia's international standing after the Charles Taylor years. The former president is awaiting a decision at The Hague court after a five-year trial on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. But Johnson-Sirleaf's seemingly unstoppable election juggernaut has chinks in its armour. The country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2009 named her as one of the people who should be barred from holding public office for 30 years for backing former warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor.
In addition to this being used as fodder for propaganda, the president was also criticised for changing her mind after having promised to serve only one-term. Realignments in Liberia’s fluid political scene are also well underway, with another grouping of four political parties under another candidate - Dew Mason - also in place.
"I think Johnson-Sirleaf needs a first round election victory. If she doesn't get the first ballot, it is most likely she will not win re-election," said Geeplay.
While this may be the last bite at the cherry for Tubman, Weah’s age - 44 - may however guarantee him another stab at the presidency as he fights to keep his cherished political dream alive. In the wake of the defeat, Weah will certainly have to re-evaluate his long-term options.
“But he still has the right to his presidential ambition given his age and hence can still wait and hope, even for 2021,” Henry Flomo, a Liberian political analyst residing in Dakar, Senegal, told Africa Review. One presidential term in Liberia is six years.
Widely regarded as Africa’s most accomplished footballer, Weah has harboured ambitions of occupying the Presidentail Mansion since the Taylor years. For this he paid dearly when his luxurious Monrovia palace was in 1996 looted and torched by thugs suspected to be allied to Taylor. Some of his family members were allegedly sexually assaulted in the incident.
Flomo, who has over the last 20 years been a member of five political parties in Liberia, says that Weah's decision to concede the convention defeat has further embellished his image as a national hero and lent credence to the notion a new breed of enlightened leadership.
It is a lesson that West Africa could learn from, according to Dakar-based history professor Mbaye Ndiaye.
“We are not likely to see the George Weah kind here in Senegal come February 2010,” he said. “You can see the signs by President [Abdoulaye] Wade’s action of not relinquishing his party to younger politicians. He (Wade) needs to borrow a page from Weah’s political book.”
Senegal goes to the polls in February 2012, and indications are that the incumbent Wade, who has been in power since 2000, is going for another term.
No comments:
Post a Comment