MONROVIA – A group, under the banner ‘Buu Yao Concerned Citizens Movement’ has accused Nimba County District #5 Representative Samuel G. Kogar of recruiting non-residents of his constituency and paying them US$50 to US$60 to register in his District.
By Gerald C. Koinyeneh, [email protected]
Although Rep. Kogar denied the allegation, he admitted that he is only assisting the natives of his district residing outside to go back home and register.
The allegation
On Wednesday, two days before the launch of phase two of the biometric voter registration exercise in the remaining nine counties including Nimba, a member of the Buu Yao Concerned Citizens Movement, Fredrick Bea accused Rep. Kogar, who is completing his second term as Nimba District #5 Representative, of recruiting people from Bong, Margibi and Montserrado counties to register.
“As we speak to you, our information is that he [Rep. Kogar] is recruiting from Monrovia, Margibi, Bong County and parts of Nimba- those who are not even residents of our district,” Bea alleged in an interview with Kool 91.9 FM, a local radio station in Paynesville, outside of Monrovia.
“They are proceeding gradually to the district and we cannot guarantee the safety of non-Buyao citizens that will be going there to infringe on the rights of our people… So, we want to call on stakeholders and leaders of our county to intervene before this goes out of hand,” he warned.
Bea said Kogar, who has spent almost 12 years as a lawmaker, has nothing to show, and that is why he has decided to get involved in such a sinister act. He said under the incumbent lawmaker, the district has been underrepresented. The lawmaker, he claimed, has failed to exercise his major responsibilities, making the district to be among the remotest parts of Nimba. Currently, there are only two policemen in the district, he claimed, adding that Kogar’s action has the proclivity to cause chaos and put the lives of those non-residents he is taking to the district at risk.
“We are peaceful people and we want to stop this process so that it can’t go out of hand. It is not good, it is undemocratic and undermined and deprive our people to make an independent decision in choosing their leaders. The election that is upcoming is very crucial. The people of our district are gearing up to elect the person whom they believe in.”
Speaking further he said: “I am calling on leaders of our land to come and probe into this activity because if Kogar has done well, he should not be involved in this kind of activit- to carry on trucking. He cannot impose himself on us by importing non-residents to our district. We are the ones living there and experiencing whatever that is happening – the bad road and darkness. We are the ones bearing the pain. We should be the ones to decide who represents us and not outsiders.”
‘Not trucking but paying my people’s way’
In debunking Bea’s claims, Rep. Kogar said he is not trucking non-residents, but assisting natives of his constituents who have expressed their desire to register there but do not have the means to go.
He said: “I have the right under the law as a lawmaker to go anywhere that I want to go. If my citizens want to go back to register in the district, as their lawmaker, I can help them to go and register – even if they are residing in Monrovia and want to go back. Even now as I speak to you, my yard is packed with people… and I am transporting them because they are my citizens and they don’t have the means.”
He said his accusers are weak opponents that do not have anything to convince the electorates but to say negative things against him.
Rep. Kogar currently serves as chairman of the opposition People’s Unification Party (PUP). His party was among more than 25 political parties that signed the Farmington River Declaration 2023, a landmark agreement calling for peaceful and credible elections comes October 10, 2023.
Voter trucking: threat to representative democracy
Voter trucking, an ominous practice where politicians lure non-resident eligible voters to their constituents for votes, has become a widespread phenomenon within Liberian body politics since the end of the war. Observers say this practice, if not put to an end, could erode the essence of representative democracy in Liberia.
In its Biometric Voter Registration Phase-one Observation Report, the Elections Coordinating Committee (ECC), Liberia’s leading election observatory group, said there were instances of voter trucking by aspirants, notably in three counties – Margibi, Montserrado, and Grand Bassa and primarily targeting first-time voters.
In its recommendations, the ECC, among other things, called on the Ministry of Justice to ensure that ongoing investigations into electoral offenses are properly conducted and completed and the outcomes made available to the public, and to also hold perpetrators accountable.
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