| By Elijah Komontey Gbarweay |
The recent outburst from Dr. Amos C. Sawyer on the late Dr. Edward Binyan Kesselly, former Chairman of the defunct Constitution Advisory Assembly and founding standard Bearer of the ruling Unity Party for allegedly tampering with the original tenure of office for all elective positions in the draft constitution was highly hypocritical and reactionary.
Dr. Sawyer who had earlier headed the Constitution Committee that drafted the original document, accused Dr. Sawyer and his committee of changing the proposed 4 year tenure of office across the board for the President, Vice President, Senators and Representatives to the present 6 to 9 years for the above positions. I believe that Sawyer is not being sincere with the Liberian people and his own conscience because he had enough time and opportunity to have spoken out during the life span of Dr Kesselly as well as changing the status quo at various time in our history.
Dr Sawyer should have either protested or to stay out of any arrangement that went against his conviction. Sadly enough, he organised the Liberian People's Party (LPP) and was poised to fully take part in the 1985 elections before he was stopped by the military government. What stopped Sawyer from setting into motion reverting to his proposed 4 year tenure just in the same way he hurriedly manipulated the scrapping of the annual celebration of the April 12 revolution and introducing the LIBERTY to replace the JJ legal tender when he had less than 5% of the entire country under his control during his four year rule as Interim president?; better still, why did he do at the Good Governance Commission to advise the government to propose for an amendment seeking the re-introduction of a 4 year tenure across the board for all elective positions in Liberia? He did nothing absolutely on those ocassions but decided to use his comfort zone in Addis Ababa to cast aspersions on a late sage that rendered his services to this country. We have to be proactive to see clearly the antics of most of our old and recycled politicians; Liberians are not that gullible as they were some 30 or 40 years ago....Sincerely, Sawyer has the moral obligation to tender in an unreserved posthumous apology to the late Dr Kesselly for bringing his name and reputable to national disrepute and embarrassment.
Dr. Sawyer who had earlier headed the Constitution Committee that drafted the original document, accused Dr. Sawyer and his committee of changing the proposed 4 year tenure of office across the board for the President, Vice President, Senators and Representatives to the present 6 to 9 years for the above positions. I believe that Sawyer is not being sincere with the Liberian people and his own conscience because he had enough time and opportunity to have spoken out during the life span of Dr Kesselly as well as changing the status quo at various time in our history.
Dr Sawyer should have either protested or to stay out of any arrangement that went against his conviction. Sadly enough, he organised the Liberian People's Party (LPP) and was poised to fully take part in the 1985 elections before he was stopped by the military government. What stopped Sawyer from setting into motion reverting to his proposed 4 year tenure just in the same way he hurriedly manipulated the scrapping of the annual celebration of the April 12 revolution and introducing the LIBERTY to replace the JJ legal tender when he had less than 5% of the entire country under his control during his four year rule as Interim president?; better still, why did he do at the Good Governance Commission to advise the government to propose for an amendment seeking the re-introduction of a 4 year tenure across the board for all elective positions in Liberia? He did nothing absolutely on those ocassions but decided to use his comfort zone in Addis Ababa to cast aspersions on a late sage that rendered his services to this country. We have to be proactive to see clearly the antics of most of our old and recycled politicians; Liberians are not that gullible as they were some 30 or 40 years ago....Sincerely, Sawyer has the moral obligation to tender in an unreserved posthumous apology to the late Dr Kesselly for bringing his name and reputable to national disrepute and embarrassment.
