The National Elections Commission (NEC) of Liberia has declared political campaigns open for the Nov. 7 run-off presidential election. In a statement on its website, NEC confirmed that the run-off would be between football icon, Mr George Weah, and the country’s incumbent Vice President, Mr Joseph Boakai. “The Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) and the Unity Party (UP) will contest the Nov. 7 presidential run-off election because the two parties obtained the highest number of votes cast on Oct. 10,” it said.
Final results of the first round showed that Weah of CDC finished with 596,037 votes, representing 38.4 percent of the total valid votes cast. Boakai, who is the standard bearer of the ruling UP, obtained a total of 446,716 votes or 28.8 percent.
It is understood that 20 presidential and 986 House of Representatives candidates contested in the Oct. 10 general elections. There are 73 seats in the Liberian House of Representatives and 30 in the Senate, whose elections hold in 2019.
The electoral body said opposition leader, Mr Charles Brumskine, of the Liberty Party finished third with 149,495 votes constituting 9.6 percent.
He is followed by Mr Prince Johnson, former warlord and candidate of the Movement for Democracy and Reconstruction (MDR), who got 127,666 votes or 8.2 percent. A prominent businessman, Alexander Cummings of the Alternative National Congress (ANC) finished fifth with 112,067 votes representing 7.2 percent.
Meanwhile, the final results posted by NEC show that a total of 1,641,922 votes were cast on Oct. 10, representing 75.1 percent voter turnout.
There are 2,183,629 voters were registered for the 2017 general elections in Liberia.
According to the commission, 1,553,348 votes or 71.1 per cent were valid, while invalid votes stood at 88,574 representing 5.4 per cent.
