VZCZCXRO9377
PP RUEHMA RUEHPA
DE RUEHMV #1431/01 3601045
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 261045Z DEC 07
FM AMEMBASSY MONROVIA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 9602
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 MONROVIA 001431 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV KDEM EAID LI
SUBJECT: LIBERIA: UNITY PARTY GAINS SENATE SEAT IN GBARPOLU 
BY-ELECTION 
 
REF: MONROVIA 1417 
 
¶1. (U) SUMMARY. The Unity Party has gained a Senate seat 
following candidate J.S.B. Theodore Momo's win in the 
December 18 Gbarpolu County by-election, President Sirleaf's 
party now has six seats in the 30 member Senate.  Two Embassy 
teams, along with UNMIL and several NGOs, observed the second 
round and found that the election was as impressively well 
run as round one was on December 4 (reftel).  Voter turnout 
was 35.2%, just under the 36% reported in round one.  The 
National Elections Commission resolved the problem in the 
first round of some polling stations having too few ballots 
for their number of registered voters.  The election used the 
2005 election voting rosters; therefore voters who were not 
eligible to vote in the 2005 Presidential election had no 
possibility to register for this election.  With the large 
number of war-displaced people who have returned to Gbarpolu 
County and those who have turned 18 since 2005, some NGOs 
estimate that more than half of the adult population was 
unable to vote.  The Unity Party spent heavily in the 
election, but observers were unable to corroborate opposition 
parties' assertions that government resources were used on 
behalf of the party.  END SUMMARY. 
 
MOMO WINS, TURNOUT HELD FOR SECOND ROUND 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (U) Two Embassy teams observed the December 18 second 
round of the Gbarpolu County by-election between Unity Party 
candidate J.S.B. Theodore Momo and independent candidate 
Armour Kanie Wesso.  Momo won the seat with 70.5% of the vote 
while Wesso took 29.5%.  Voter turn-out was 35.2% (near to 
the 36% reported in the first round). 
 
ANOTHER IMPRESSIVELY WELL RUN ELECTION 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (U) Just as with the December 4 round one election, 
Embassy teams visited 27 out of 90 polling stations and were 
impressed at how smoothly and transparently the election was 
run.  They observed that all polls were fully staffed with 
trained election personnel.  LNP officers kept the lines 
orderly and showed no signs of interfering in the process. 
Voters at all polling stations had the left corner of their 
voter ID card cut off and their thumbnail dyed as they voted 
to prevent them from voting again.  Vote counting was done 
systematically at each site immediately following the poll 
closure and the tally sheets were turned into the NEC. 
Candidate representatives monitoring the polling sites told 
the Embassy teams they were very satisfied with how closely 
election procedures were being followed.  All sites the teams 
visited opened within ten minutes of the 8:00 AM start time 
and closed on time at 6:00 PM.  The NEC appeared to have 
addressed the problem in the first round of a potential 
shortage of ballots (reftel) by increasing the frequency of 
supervisory visits to all polling stations.  Supervisors 
carried extra ballots in their cars and were on call to 
respond to any shortage.  There were no reports of any actual 
shortages of ballots. 
 
2005 VOTER REGISTRATION LISTS USED 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶4. (U) NEC Co-Chairman Elizabeth J. Nelson told EmbOffs that 
she considered it unfair to hold the by-election using voter 
registration lists that had not been updated since before the 
2005 Presidential Election, disfranchising all persons who 
have turned 18 since 2005, whereas no one who has left the 
county or died since 2005 has been removed from the list. 
She noted that Gbarpolu County was particularly hard hit 
during the war and had one of the highest percentages of 
displaced persons in the whole country, and many of those 
people have returned home since 2005.  (Note:  It is 
difficult to assess how many of these are still registered in 
other counties.  End note.)  IFES and IRI observers estimated 
that up to half of the County's adult population was 
systematically excluded from the election because they could 
not register.  (Note: Lack of current census data makes this 
impossible to verify.  End note.) 
 
¶5. (SBU) Nelson said she felt so strongly about the need to 
open registration in Gbarpolu County, she added USD 5 million 
to the budget request simply to open the list.  Her request, 
however, was denied as the GOL wanted to start 
re-registration of all voters nationwide following the 
upcoming boundary harmonization exercise for local 
municipalities and counties.  She also said that NEC frankly 
could not afford the USD 5 million for open registration for 
this by-election because it would then set the precedent of 
the need to pay for it for all future by-elections. 
 
 
MONROVIA 00001431  002 OF 002 
 
 
CAMPAIGNING MADE A DIFFERENCE: 
CASH, T-SHIRTS, RICE, AND RIDES 
------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (U) Momo's victory was greatly helped by the campaigning 
efforts of President Sirleaf and other Unity Party officials 
in Gbarpolu County.  Sirleaf visited a few campaign sites 
near the county capital Bopolu on December 16.  The 
treacherous dirt road between Monrovia and Bopolu had been 
substantially improved prior to her arrival.  Her security 
detail told us that she was passing out 20 Liberian dollar 
bills (33 U.S. cents), Momo T-shirts, and bags of rice at all 
the campaign stops.  EmbOffs observed several buses of voters 
being transported from Monrovia, reportedly financed by Unity 
Party, in order to vote in their home county of Gbarpolu. 
 
¶7. (U) Independent candidate Wesso could not afford even to 
hire representatives to monitor all of the polling stations 
and had few, if any, campaign goodies to distribute.  He did, 
however, walk the northern half of Gbarpolu County (most of 
which is inaccessible to vehicles) and appealed to voters 
there with a message of "I came here.  They didn't.  Who do 
you think will represent your interests better?"  Voters in 
the North responded well by solidly supporting Wesso but they 
were outvoted by the more densely populated South. 
 
¶8. (SBU) COMMENT:  Not all NGO observers believed that the 
lack of open registration period stemmed only from budgetary 
issues but rather a Unity Party effort to have the GOL 
postpone new voter registrations for its own political gain, 
in that the rural villagers, Wesso's base, were the ones that 
were most likely displaced by the war.  All NGOs agreed, 
however, that the NEC had conducted an open, transparent, 
free, and fair election with all the resources it could.  We 
have heard several complaints from the opposition that the 
Unity Party used GOL resources in running the campaign, but 
we have not to seen any concrete evidence of this practice. 
 
Booth