By Bill W. Cooper
Montserrado County Senator, Abraham Darius Dillon, has received his share of the second US$15,000 intended for ‘Legislative Engagement’ but has allegedly presented his to the County Development Council to expend.
Recently, Dillon like all other legislators received the first phase of US$15,000 for legislative engagement but was heavily criticized by Liberians on grounds that the receiving of the funds was not timely amidst the resurgence of the Covid-19 in the country.
Acknowledging receipt of the money through a press conference yesterday in Monrovia, the County Development Council Secretary General/Project Director, Jimmy George, intimated that the amount allotted to Sen. Dillon’s office was signed for and received by the Council leadership over the weekend.
Amb. Jimmy has on behalf of the Montserrado County Senator vowed to use the US$15,000 in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic despite it being rejected by health authorities before.
“When the news of the second half of the legislative engagement money was made available to lawmakers, the Council met with Sen. Dillon and advised him to accept the money and turn it over to the county and be used in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic,” Amb. Jimmy explained.
“Our appeal was granted and we are now pleased to announce that we have the money and will be using the majority of said amount towards the fight against the COVID-19 with a small portion used for other interventions, because this is no time for politics especially during a public health emergency,” he stressed.
Jimmy further disclosed that in the coming days, the Council on behalf of the Montserrado County Senator will also be making donations to clinics/health facilities as well as reaching out to other needy organizations.
It can be recalled that Sen. Dillon donated to the Montserrado County Health Team (MCHT) an amount of US$7,500 intended to assist the government through the Health Ministry fight against the pandemic from his first batch of US$15,000 received as ‘Legislative engagement’ but was since rejected.
On Wednesday, July 21, 2021, the head of the MCHT, Dr. Watta Wapoe on behalf of the Health Minister, Dr. Wilhelmina Jallah returned to the office of Sen. Dillon the US$7,500 and stated, “We reject this money because of its controversy.”
“We are aware that members of the Legislature received US$15,000 for purpose not clearly defined. We therefore, firmly encourage the Senator to consider other priorities rather than dragging the Incident Management System into the US$15,000 controversy,” Dr. Wapoe added.