Monrovia – Long John, Moustapha and Ivorian are well known by the police for being suspected hardened criminals who often carryout heists and mayhem on residents of Monrovia, yet convicting them has been a challenge.
Report by Lennart Dodoo, [email protected]
Without fear of police apprehension, these three men explained to journalists last Wednesday about being part of an alleged well-orchestrated plot intended to assassinate soccer legend George Weah, leader of the Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) opting to be Liberia’s next President after October polls.
The men claimed they were hired by businessman George Kailondo who was accordingly acting in concert with Defense Minister Brownie Samukai and Vice President Joseph Boakai to create commotion during the CDC political rally that took place on August 19 which would have led to the taking down of Weah by hired Russian assassins.
Kailondo is the UP’s Montserrado County Campaign Chairman while Minister Samukai is a staunch supporter of Vice President Boakai’s bid for the presidency.
Kailondo termed the allegation as rubbish that deserves not to be dignified.
But the spokesman of the CDC youth wing does not take the confession by the men lightly, though they provided no concrete evidence besides some dozens of UP campaign T-Shirts they claimed were given to them by Mr. Kailondo.
The ‘Plot’
Speaking to reporters, the spokesman of the CDC youth league, Alvin Wesseh, explained that the plan was to for the three men and their group of thugs who would have all worn UP campaign T-shirt and planted at strategic locations, would have thrown stones at Senator Weah and his supporters to create a state of confusion, thereby, giving an unnoticed opportunity to the hired snipers from Russia to kill Weah.
‘Ivorian’ claimed to be the leader of the group. He said he was contacted by Kailondo who he has known for a very long time. According to him, when Kailondo called him he also contacted Moustapha and Long John to accompany him to see Kailondo at his residence.
“Kailondo called me because I have been rolling with him for a very long time.
“He and I have good rapport. Recently, he met me and said ‘my man I want see you to my house’ and I even left my black Gucci cap at his house in his living room right under the table near the swimming pool under the table. I called Mustapha, Long John and he instructed us about the operations,” he revealed.
He explained that they were given the T-shirts and promised motorbikes for the mission with the mandate that they were to create disturbance at the party’s headquarters during which time Weah would have been killed by the hired assassins while delivering his speech at the party’s headquarters.
He said they were promised US$10,000 for the mission but were given L$2,000 for them to drug themselves ahead of the mission.
‘Ivorian’ further explained while they were with Kailondo, Kailondo received a call after which he came back to them asking, “The papay say y’all sure y’all can do it?” This, he said, gave him the hint that the Vice President was involved in the conspiracy.
“I have no cause lying on Kailondo, Joseph Boakai and Brownie Samukai. But these people feel that this country is for them.”
“We don’t want to live that life. Look at my life, I’m supposed to have gone far, but Madam Sirleaf fooled us, we are not here for that life,” he explained.
“I said to myself that is complete foolishness for us to continue killing our brothers and sisters for the country to go back to war.”
“We want to go to the police and Mustapha said no and we came to the CDC’s headquarters to explain the situation to the officials,” he added.
For Mustapha Sesay, he recounted that he was hired in 2014 to cause instability at the PHP between supporters of George Weah and Robert Sirleaf during the special senatorial elections.
“Since 2014, we have been incited and hired to do things that we were not to do. We did those things because of life conditions in our country, but we were not willing to do those things,” he said.
“We were told that George Weah needed to be assassinated because we have done it before and they know we can do it again.
During the night of the CDC’s launching, we passed at the headquarters, but people identified us because the pickup was not tainted,” he said.
He said following the identification and coupled with their lifestyles, they became afraid and decided to take precaution.
“We continue to receive calls of encouragement that we should not be afraid,” he said.
George Weah’s Response
Speaking on the matter for the first time since the allegation was made last Wednesday, Senator Weah told supporters in Bomi County there is no human being who has the ability to take his life.
Senator Weah: “Mr. Boakai and his colleagues who think they can induce our young people to harm me, I can say to Boakai that there’s no man or woman that can harm me. “
“Any man or woman born of a woman, beside God will never harm me. I can tell Boakai that you can pay thousands of dollars to somebody to harm me, once that person comes closer to me, he’ll change.
He’ll change simply because I am a nice person and I have a good heart. No one in Liberia will ever harm me because I have done nothing wrong to any family.”
The Police
Police Spokesman Sam Collins told FrontPageAfrica in a telephone interview that the Liberia National Police takes the allegation very seriously.
He, however, failed to say whether or not the police have invited any of the accusers to aid with investigation.
Meanwhile, multiple attempts by FrontPageAfrica to get a response from the Unity Party proved futile.
