Four things to watch in 2022 as Sierra Leone and Liberia prepare for polls
Liberia and neighbouring Sierra Leone will be preparing for 2023 general elections next year, and the presidents of both countries will be eligible for a second term. Sierra Leone’s Maada Bio and Liberia’s George Weah will be hoping to use their central bank’s currency changes to make a strong campaign statement concerning the economy.
Historically, elections in both countries are competitive, but ongoing events risk destabilising the opposition. The main opposition leader in Sierra Leone is standing trial for corruption while those in Liberia are struggling to salvage their coalition after initial signs of promise. However, losses at polls held in the past year show that a rift between Weah and his own vice president threaten his re-election. Here are four political dynamics to watch as both countries go into campaign season.
1. Currency changes
This month, Sierra Leone’s parliament cleared the central bank to redenominate the leone with three fewer zeros. Bank governor Kelfala Kallon has repeatedly blamed hoarders since a cash shortage jolted banks last year, and he is now looking to force cash in circulation back into the formal economy. If this redenomination succeeds in stabilising money supply and shoring up public faith in the financial system, Bio’s re-election campaign will get a boost.
So will Weah’s across the border in Liberia. The central bank there is also changing the currency to replace mutilated banknotes and curb cash shortages. Redesigned LRD100 banknotes were printed last month and the bank plans to roll out new designs of the LRD20, LRD50, LRD500 and LRD1000 from next year (See: New banknotes and barriers to cryptocurrency adoption in Liberia). This currency changeover will be very politically sensitive considering recent schemes to print money and control money supply resulted in scandals.
2. State of the opposition
Samura Kamara of the All People’s Congress (APC) lost to Bio in Sierra Leone’s 2018 presidential election. He is again the APC’s forerunner to challenge Bio in 2023, but this ambition is threatened by his corruption trial that began this month. The former foreign affairs minister is one of five ex-government officials who are accused of misappropriation relating to the reconstruction of an embassy building. His continued trial will be a source of political tension in the coming year and it will be a hefty setback for the APC if a guilty verdict sidelines him, considering his stature in the country’s northwest and north where most of the party’s supporters are based.
In Liberia, ex-vice president Joseph Boakai and former Coca Cola executive Alexander Cummings are tussling to be the presidential candidate for the Coalition of Political Parties (CPP). But the opposition merger is on the brink because of the discord between the constituent parties (See: Liberia opposition merger on the brink ahead of 2023 polls). The outcome of the 2023 presidential election will most likely be determined through informal alliances between individual politicians instead of parties. For example, the influential ex-rebel Prince Johnson lost out in the first round of the 2017 presidential election. Out of the race, he then struck an alliance with Weah that gave Weah the winning edge against Boakai in the second round.
3. Weah vs the VP
Liberia’s Weah will also be leading his own troubled coalition into the elections. The ruling Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) has lost parliamentary seats for Montserrado and Bong counties to the CPP and others since December 2020. Those losses are significant because Weah and Vice President Jewel Howard-Taylor come from Montserrado and Bong respectively, which are two of the country’s most populous counties. A rift between both leaders has fractured the relationship between the CDC’s constituent parties, and a cabinet turf war between Howard-Taylor and Weah’s right-hand man Nathaniel McGill may work against the party in 2023.
4. Census in Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone has just concluded a controversial census that will likely have significant electoral consequences. The World Bank withdrew support at the last minute citing disagreements with the authorities. Police also arrested opposition leaders who criticised the decision to organise a census five years after the last one and around a year before fresh elections. The precedent indicates that delimitation and the distribution of population figures will create a flashpoint when the census results are announced next year. (See: Sierra Leone census off to a rocky start).
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