Let me start this Annual Message by thanking Our Common Creator for the lives of all of us and wishing for all of you a Happy New Year, 2017.
The fact that we are alive in this New Year gives us another opportunity to use what Our Common Creator, God, Allah, Nngala, Glaypor, Kamba, has given us to improve our living conditions in a lasting way. Our Country is now the second poorest country in Africa and the fifth poorest country in the world because we have not been using and we are not using what Our Common Creator has given us to help ourselves.
The poor people of Liberia are the vast majority of the people of Liberia and they can get whatever they want through fair elections in which leaders who have the interest of poor people can be elected. However, mass poverty continues because the poor people have not come together to use their vast majority in their interest.
Opinion leaders and persons who want to get elected to use the people’s (the government’s) money for themselves continue to use money to buy the people’s votes through the actions of the opinion leaders. Unfair practices of the National Elections Commission (NEC) contribute to the election of bad persons; persons who are corrupt and do not have the interest of the poor people at heart.
The unfair practices of NEC are seen in allowing foreigners to run as candidates in elections, allowing foreigners to vote in elections, placing the wrong names of candidates on ballot boxes and determining a favored political party in advance of the 2017 election, when NEC announced publicly that the All Liberian Party is a civilized party. All peaceful efforts must be used to change NEC because the present NEC is not capable of organizing Fair Elections, especially in 2017.
I am standing to be the next President of Liberia because I have the interest of all Liberians, particularly the poor people, at heart, as my nearly 50 years record clearly shows. Over the years, I have provided leadership in making the Liberian people conscious of the fact that Liberia belongs to all Liberians and all Liberians have to right to all of the resources in Liberia.
Good leadership, good governance calls for taking action to ensure that all Liberians have equal access to all of Liberia’s resources through the market place and the ballot box. My leadership works for adding value to all of resources, as in the education of our human resources and as in the promotion of manufacturing under Liberian ownership, using our raw materials here instead of exporting them.
Through my leadership, the most brutal government action against the poor people, the Hut Tax, was eliminated and a significant part of mass poverty end immediately.
With my leadership, the Decent Work Bill, designed to give the Working People of Liberia better living conditions, was passed into Law, after the persons inthe National Legislature, who are supposed to be representing the [people, sat on the Bill for five long years, refusing to pass the Bill into Law.
My May Day, International Labor Day Message of 2016 provided the enabling effect in a massive campaign, mobilizing the Working People to put unprecedented pressure on the Legislators to Pass the Bill into Law.
Now, the problem remains that of implementing the Decent Work Law. It is to the implementation of this Law that a major part of campaign for the Presidency is committed.
In essence, this Campaign is not my Campaign but the Campaign of all Patriotic Liberians who for Liberia to become a better place in which all Liberians can live, experiencing justice for all, the only ingredient for lasting peace and progress for all Liberians.
The overcoming of the ebola crisis clearly shows when the people come together and work together, there is problem facing them that they can not solve. I provided leadership here through the Organization called Servants of Africa Fighting Ebola (SAFE).
The Organization, Liberians for Tipoteh (LIFT), is being organized in all of the 15 Counties of Liberia and the poor people of Liberia are being called upon to come together in LIFT to lift the poor people and to lift Liberia by stopping massive corruption and poverty.
The proposed MOJA Party is standing in readiness to push its struggle for becoming officially certificated to continue to lead the People’s Struggle for Justice, Peace and Progress for all Liberians.
In this Struggle, I work to mobilize leaders at the political, social and economic levels to ensure victory for the People through fair elections because it is only through this Team of Patriotic Leaders that Liberia can be managed in the interest of the Liberian People.
This leadership is based on the Platform of What was been done and what is being done. The parading platforms stating what will be done if elected remain unworkable because no one will do what he or she has not done.
Therefore, I am saying here in this Message that through my leadership, Liberians will take Ownership of Liberia because this is the work that I have been doing and continue to do successfully in the private capacity, as seen in the multiplicity of Hataee Centers, the Community Radio Stations, the Newspapers, the Workers, Women, Youth and Business Organizations making progress in the democratic struggle for RIGHTS AND RICE!
In this Struggle, the people of Liberia, especially the youth who remain very frustrated because of the lack of good opportunities, are being convinced of the use of peaceful means, such as the electoral process, to bring about change for the better.
Now, foreigners are getting at least 20 million United States dollars a month doing jobs and owning businesses that Liberians should be doing and owning. This anti-Liberian situation must change into a pro-Liberian situation! And it will change sooner than later through our peaceful Struggle for Justice, Peace and Progress for all Liberians.
This change will come through fair elections when the people come together with one voice. Therefore, let the People of Liberia come out in their hundreds of thousands from February 1 to March 7 2017 to get their Voter Registration Cards, which they must have in order to vote in October 2017.
Gweh Feh Kpei! (the Kpelle Language for the Struggle Continues!)
Nnangala kpor ga! (The Kpelle Language for Let God be with all of you!)
p.s. At least 40 percent of the People of Liberia speak Kpelle.