Monrovia – Institute for Research and Democratic Development (IREDD) 2022 citizens’ perception survey has shown that the three branches of government; the Legislature, the Executive, and the Judiciary have performed poorly.
IREDD is a policy research and democratic governance monitoring and advocacy group. The survey covered 10 months and was conducted in eight of the 15 counties in Liberia.
J.H. Webster Clayeh (0886729972)[email protected]
Matthias Yeanay the Executive Director of the Institute for Research and Democratic Development at the press conference to journalists at the head office that IREDD being cognizant of its advocacy role for socioeconomic justice, transparency, and accountability in public service, at the start of 2022 incorporated in its monitoring work plan, a provision for citizens to assess how they perceive their government performance on five (5) basic functions of governance in terms of public service administration.
“An analysis of the 10 long months of repeated engagements with citizens across the eight (8) mentioned counties revealed on average that 62% or 4,392 of the 7,200 citizens interviewed perceived the performance of both the Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary Branches as poor,” Yeanay said.
According to Yeanay, IREED used the five basic functions of governments and conducted an open-ended perception survey during its project activities implementation across eight (8) of Liberia’s fifteen (15) counties.
He said: “People from Montserrado, Margibi, Grand Bassa, Bong, Nimba, Cape Mount, Lofa, and Grand Gedeh. Citizens were asked to assess the government’s performance on a scale of poor, fair, and good.”
He added that five (5) functions used for the government’s 2022 performance in terms of output for the public good were drawn from nine known functions of governments globally of which Liberia is no exception.
“To ensure a balanced assessment, the three branches that made up the Government of Liberia were separately assessed on the 5 givens through the structural questionnaires administered alongside IREDD’s project activities implementation from January – October 2022. During these 10 months, IREDD directly engaged 7,200 citizens, (3,168 males and males and 4,032 females) to assess the government performance as they perceive it on (5) key functions of governments, he said.
Administration of Justice, and unconditional respect for rule of law, Yeanay says are some of the things hindering the performance of the three branches of government.
He added that respondents perceive the Executive Branch’s action as selective justice, and failure to respect and implement the rule of law in terms of court rulings. An example he says is Justice Kabineh M Ja’neh case.
The respondents perceive the Legislative Branch as having weak oversight to prevent and deter disrespect for the rule of law, Yeaney said.
He further stressed that respondents perceive the Judiciary Branch as willfully delaying hearing cases within statutory periods, and failing to effect available legal remedies to compel compliance to strengthen respect for the rule of law.
“Respondents perceive the Executive Branch of unequal protection for citizens. The countless number of unexplained deaths across the country without remedial action. Examples are Princess Cooper, student Christopher Walter Sisulu Sivili of UL, and others,” he added.