MONROVIA, Liberia – Charles Walker Brumskine, the standard bearer of the opposition Liberty Party, says he is not comfortable with the current configuration of commissioners at the National Elections Commission and wants them to recuse themselves from investigating his party’s alleged claims of elections fraud.

Jerome Korkoya, chairman of NEC, recently addressed a news conference where he said there was “not any legal basis for a re-run of the process,” referring to the election.

He also described the claims of elections fraud by the political parties as “dangerous lies” which were not helpful to the electoral process.

He further cautioned the political parties against presenting false documents with the intent to undermine the credibility of the commission.

But after a speech where he welcomed the Supreme Court’s decision to order NEC to halt preparations for a runoff, Brumskine said his lawyers would be asking the commissioners to recuse themselves, as they have “already pre-judged his party’s evidence and the case.”

The Liberty Party standard bearer threatened to seek redress from the Supreme Court “if the commissioners refuse to recuse themselves.”

Brumskine’s statement appears to be supported and pushed further by Joseph Boakai, the Unity Party standard bearer, who also told the AFP that NEC needed to be “sanitized” before the runoff.

“There are a lot of irregularities, we believe, most of them really calculated to make this election go the way it went,” he was quoted as saying. The vice president also said the election was “designed to be rigged.”

NEC commissioners have given no signs yet that they plan to step aside.

Featured photo by Zeze Evans Ballah