Capitol Hill, Monrovia – Vice President Jewel Howard Taylor and leaders of the 54th Legislature have heaped praises on fallen Liberian statesmen and legal luminary, Cllr. Charles Walker Brumskine.
At the state funeral on Thursday at the rotunda of the Capitol Building, VP Taylor said the late Cllr. Brumskine had a resilient spirit, free thinker, a committed man and a respected jurist of renowned repute.”
But above all, the Vice President said Cllr. Brumskine was a “giant above his peers.”
In her eulogy, she said: “Despite his political setbacks, which could have made him broken or burden—or to surrender to self-pity and resign from public life, he still stood tall.”
“He always wore a huge smile whenever people saw him,” she added.
On Thursday, mourners including partisans of the opposition Liberty Party led by its political leader, Senator Nyonblee Karngar Lawrence, Mrs. Esther Brumskine and Children including Charles Brumskine, Jr. and Charlyne Brumskine led the procession from the Samuel Stryker Funeral Home to the Capitol for the lying in state of the body.
The solemn and melancholic event also saw members of the Liberian Bar Association, collaborating Political Parties and dozens of sympathizers dressed in black or Liberty Party’s Shirt with images of the fallen statesman, walking alongside the float carrying the flag-draped coffin.
Cllr. Brumskine hailed through the rank of the National Patriotic Party (NPP) of former President Charles Taylor, and upon the NPP’s resounding victory in 1997, became Senior Senator of Grand Bassa County. He was then elected as President Pro Tempore of the Liberian Senate, but two years later, he resigned after a political fallout with President Taylor.
He would later return triumphantly in 2002 and declare his intention to challenged Taylor in the Presidential election that was scheduled in 2003.
“To those of us who knew him and loved him,” she said “and ache with his passing; many knew him to be a Father, Brother, Husband, Counselor, Stalwart; Colleague, Mentor, a Humanitarian and a true friend to many; including me. He was the patriarch of Grand Bassa and its hero. We have lost the light of our nation.”
– Vice President Jewel Howard-Taylor
However, the election did not hold due to the civil war, but Brumskine would return in 2004, formed the Liberty Party and contest unsuccessfully in three successive presidential elections.
In 2017, Cllr. Brumskine obtained the total vote count of 144, 353, representing 9.8 percent demanded a rerun claiming that massive fraud and irregularities are to blame for preliminary results indicating that the LP performed poorly.
Brumskine argued that the elections were faced with “gross irregularities and fraud that undercut the integrity of the process as well as denying voters their constitutional rights to vote.”
He challenged the case in court, but the Supreme Court ruled that though there were irregularities in the process they were not “egregious” to warrant a rerun of the elections.
VP Taylor further eulogizing the late legal luminary said, “Former Senator Brumskine was a true champion for Liberia, an executive member of the National Patriotic Party; the Vision Bearer and Soul of the Liberty Party; a true son of Grand Bassa County and a man of the people.”
“To those of us who knew him and loved him,” she said “and ache with his passing; many knew him to be a Father, Brother, Husband, Counselor, Stalwart; Colleague, Mentor, a Humanitarian and a true friend to many; including me. He was the patriarch of Grand Bassa and its hero. We have lost the light of our nation,” VP Taylor said.
Pro Tempore Albert Chie said Cllr. Brumskine has been called from labor to rest indicating “that our colleague has returned to our creator who remained us that we came from dust and we will return back to dust.”
Senator Varney Sherman of Cape Mount County, delivering the eulogy on behalf of the Liberian Senate said the late Brumskine was a legal and season lawyer and outstanding politician who was dictated to his services to the Liberian people.
Sherman said as a close friend to Brumskine, he knew him to be a true patriot who sacrificed his career and all he had for Liberia and even had the desire to serve at the highest level of government (the presidency).
“Charlie believed that his greatest service to the people was to service the presidency which came from our experience as a people that some much change can be achieved within the shortest possible time in political office,” he said.
Sherman said even through Brumskine did not achieve his goal up to death, but he never gives up on the Liberian people until his death.
He said when Brumskine had always wanted to serve at the top of every position he held adding that it was unfortunate that President Charles Taylor did not understand that “Brumskine will one day want to be a President of Liberia.”