September 2nd was a bad day for
members of the Independent Election Commission (IEC) of the Grand Gedeh
Association in the Americas; they were slammed with a four-year ban from participating
in all electoral processes within the Grand Gedeh Community.
Those ban were Mrs. Nora Solo-Moore,
Chairperson; Kwame Opa Weeks, Co-chairman; James Youboty, Secretary; and Jeje
Jackson and Todd Garlo as members. They oversaw the 2013 election that took
place in Dallas, Texas in May this year.
Until the Board derived the decision to bar
them, in the wake of protest filed by the campaign team of the Dadoua Network,
all five commissioners had assured the people of Grand Gedeh that they were
credible and solicited the people’s trust.
But by the time the elections were over in
Dallas, Texas, it was a full blown conclusion that the Nora Moore Commission
was probably the most fouled commission ever to handled GGAA elections. The five
members of IEC unreservedly drenched their reputations with massive fraud
committed by fraudulently passing unto Mr. Tilman Collins a questionable and
fouled election victory.
On top of their rather very questionable
activities during the election, as have been punished by the National Board of
Directors, the Commission has in fact done one of the most ineffectual things
by writing their report with pen for the Board’s consumption.
One board member told me, “This is
disgraceful that our commission that was funded could not even type their
report and submit it to us….”
But in a letter, dated September 2, 2013, signed
by Board Chairman Eric Kohn, and addressed to the former Chairperson of the
Commission, Mrs. Nora Solo-Moore, the Board of Directors minced no words in
declaring that the Commissioner will not take part in election process and/or
serving as commissioner of election for any Grand Gedeh organization and
community.
What was even more ironic but diplomatic was
the Board in one breath thanked the five commissioners, but in another breath
hammered them with what most Grand Gedeans considered the harshest punitive
action taken against any member of the GGAA since its establishment.
Says the Board, “…all members of the
dissolved IEC including you are barred from participating in any electoral
process, elections commissions’ activities within the Grand Gedeh Association
in the Americas, Inc. for four years. The reason is that IEC inability to
account for the appearance of five (5) excess ballots. This act on the part of
IEC created suspicions which almost undermined the integrity of election and
tended to loosening cohesiveness of electoral process and community unity.”
With this action, the five commissioners
are barred from serving as election commissioners, or simply put; they are
barred from handling any election portfolio for the next four years.
The Board warned, “Mrs. Moore it is the
sincere expectation of the National Board of Directors that members of the
dissolved IEC will adhere to the above decision.” It is not known what other
measures the Board would institute if any member of the dissolved election
commission disobeys this punitive action.
Observers say, the five men have lost
credibility over the handling of election within the Grand Gedeh Community, and
one Dadoua supporter puts it rather raw, “They dashed our hope; they destroyed
our respect for them; and they created a mess of themselves, so they should
learn and recreate a credible reputation for themselves after four years.”
