LIBERIA POLLS
Joseph Boakai, following October’s first round.
The NEC said that with 98.1 per cent of votes counted, Boakai had only secured 38.5 per cent support.
Ahead of Thursday’s result announcement, armed and helmeted police deployed outside the poll body’s headquarters as Weah supporters gathered and began rejoicing.
“The Liberian people clearly made their choice... and all together we are very confident in the result of the electoral process,” tweeted Weah before the official results were announced.
Sirleaf ’s office said it had set up a team “for the proper management and orderly transfer of executive power from one democratically elected president to another”, adding that it included several ministers.
The tumultuous events of the past 70 years in Liberia, where an estimated 250,000 people died during back-to-back civil wars between 1989 and 2003, have prevented a democratic handover from taking place since 1944.
Sirleaf ’s predecessor, Charles Taylor, fled the country in 2003, hoping to avoid prosecution for funding rebel groups in Sierra Leone. Two presidents who served prior to Taylor were assassinated.
The United Nations and regional bloc Economic Community of West African States hailed the peaceful nature of the vote, with UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres praising “the government, political parties and the people of Liberia for the orderly poll”, which the European Union said “generally respected constitutional rules”.
The election passed without major incident despite weeks of delays caused by legal challenges and many said they were looking forward to a peaceful handover after 12 years under Sirleaf.
The Sirleaf administration, elected in 2005, guided the nation out of the ruins of war and through the horrors of the 201416 Ebola crisis, but is accused of failing to combat poverty and corruption.
Weah, the only African ever to have won Fifa’s World Player of the Year and the coveted Ballon D’Or football award, missed out on the presidency in a 2005 bid.
He was similarly frustrated when he ran for vice-president in 2011, but his Congress for Democratic Change party repeatedly urged its young and exuberant supporters to keep calm. AFP