By Precious D. Freeman
“If I run against Sen. Dan Morais 1,000 times in Maryland County, I will beat him 1,000 times and he knows it,” the recently announced senator-elect James Biney assures.
Biney stressed, “I won the election with almost 10,000 votes and a margin of approximately 4500 votes separating me and my nearest contender and I beat them with no dirt around it.”
He bragged that Sen. Morais knew he would be beaten once he (Biney) was qualified to run but pointed out, “My focus now is getting down to doing the people’s work.”
The ruling Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) candidate, Biney said, “This was the reason why he fought tooth and nail to stop me and; his false impression is only in Monrovia because no cheating occurred in Montserrado or Bong or Bassa or Lofa or the interior of River Gee where Finda hails from.”
Contrary to the claims by six of his contenders including the incumbent senator Morias of cheating in the just ended senatorial election that was conducted in the county, Biney wondered that if there were identified fraud and irregularities why a single candidate could not file pre-voting complaints to the NEC?
In a statement issued on yesterday under the signature of the senator-elect, he stated that if there were no observers, not one candidate raised any issue of fraud or uncertainty at any of the precincts before the elections or after the elections.
Mr. Biney who claimed that he also has all the tally sheets signed by observers of all six contenders including those representing Sen. Dan Morais added, “I advise that you don’t write unsubstantiated rumors because the voting process in Maryland was transparent and exceptionally clear of any pre-voting complaints.”
“All candidates had two representatives each at every polling precinct and eight of us had our observers at all, not at some, but at all polling centers before 6 A.M. on Tuesday,” the contested senator-elect explained.
“The transparent ballot boxes were displayed at every precinct before the voting commenced. Every observer or candidate representative established for themselves that the boxes were empty, “he said.
According to him, basically the vote’s margins across the county districts are similar to the sizes of their respective rallies of supporters they exhibited in public and that “During the campaign. Sen. Morais was not able to rally 300 supporters in Karluway District at any point.”
“I rallied the two largest gatherings of supporters in Karluway in recent history. I beat even the Representative of the district convincingly. Sen. Morais did not even come third there. Take the video and watch my entry into Pleebo or my entry into Harper and draw your own conclusions, “he boasted.
“Gikor won mainly the towns around Pleebo where he hails from and Sen. Morais won mainly in his Nyemoweh towns and in the cities of Pleebo and in Harper where the candidates’ observers were visible as early as 6 A.M. and the voters were in line before 6 A.M., I won every precinct including the city hall, a 3-minute walk from Sen. Morais’s house,” he explained.
“The people of Maryland are kind but they don’t forget those who are misbehaving and generating lies and those are trying to blemish Marylanders’ mandate will pay a huge future price at subsequent elections, “he said.
It can be recalled that all candidates except the CDC candidate Biney had requested that the NEC puts a halt the process of tallying or counting of votes obtained from the just ended electoral process that now announced a winner of the county.
According to the participating defeated candidates, they filed a communication to the head of the NEC in the county in accordance to the New Election Law requesting an investigation into the process which according to them has several fraud, irregularities and discrepancies that were being unearth just when the votes was about to be tallied.
Addressing a press conference in Maryland on last Friday, former Ambassador John Ballout an independent candidate flanked by Philip Anderson, candidate of the Liberia Restoration Party; John; Dan Morias, independent candidate, Eric Giko, representing the CPP, Isaac Roland, independent candidate, Emmanuel Wollor, Rainbow Alliance and Wilbert Yancy, independent candidate said, “We are individually and collectively as candidates and stakeholders in the 2020 senatorial election demand an immediate halt to an electoral process in Maryland County.”
When out-going senator Morias was question about their decision in the dire minute of the process, he stated, “Yes, we as candidates have the authority to call for a halt of the process because we see the shenanigans and the petty criminal attitudes begin exhibited.”
However, according to the aggrieved candidates, minutes following the filing of their communication to the election magistrate in the county, they requested a receipt but in a hasty written response on the receipt provided them the magistrate wrote, “Acknowledged receipt but do not agree to all of the things therein.”
The defeated candidates said the magistrate’s response suggested that he has pre-judged the content of their communication and frowned that this is a magistrate that had taken up assignment in the county just six days to the elections.