Opposition presidential aspirant Dr. Jeremiah Z. Whapoe has told locals in Bomi County, western Liberia that he is not desperate to be president of the country, but he is desperate to solve their social problems including lack of free health care and food, among others.
Dr. Whapoe who contested and lost the 2017 presidential election, is among several other opposition figures aspiring for the nation’s highest seat as Liberians gear up for the 2023 presidential and legislative elections.
This will be a battle among the various opposition presidential aspirants and incumbent President George Manneh Weah of the ruling Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC) who is seeking his second six-year term.
Dr. Whapoe told a town hall meeting in Gbah-jakeh on Saturday that God has brought him out as a solution to the people’s and the society’s problems.
“One thing I can tell Liberian people is that I am not desperate to become president. I am not desperate. God has blessed me already. Today if I want to get on the plane and leave this country I can go. If I want to go anywhere I can go,” he said.
As a citizen, Dr. Whapoe explained that his mission in Liberia is simple and it’s not just to come here and look for the presidency.
“I’m not desperate for the presidency! I’m not desperate, but there are few things I’m desperate for. I am desperate so that you poor man, because of condition, because of poverty that you [are] not able to go to hospital, I am desperate so you can have free healthcare,” said Dr. Whapoe.
Dr. Whapoe who has tailored his main political message toward agricultural revolution as one of the means of reducing hunger in Liberia has also emphasized that he is desperate to see parents who are unable to feed their children daily become capable of feeding their children three times a day.
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He lamented that Liberia is in a trap of poverty, adding: “We are trapped and because of poverty, Liberians, the mothers, the fathers, the children, the elders, nobody is respected any more.”
“When you are poor, you can’t get respect; when you are poor, nobody recognizes you; when you are poor, you can compromise your integrity,” he stated.
In building his case for his presidential ambition, Dr. Whapoe boasted that he will not be poor again because God has blessed him, recalling that in 2017, he was the only presidential candidate that didn’t borrow money from anybody but used his own cash to sponsor his campaign.
“I spent $950,000 United States Dollars for my campaign, I didn’t borrow it from anybody. The reason is that when God gives you, share with people,” he said.
But Dr. Whapoe stated that some of his compatriots are still paying their debts up to present.
He argued that due to the wrong decisions that Liberians made in killing President William R. Tolbert for rice, rewarding those who killed their parents and voting Charles Taylor as their president, God in his anger, made Liberians “wise in their own foolishness,” allowing them to pick the wrong leaders.
Additionally, Dr. Whapoe said had incumbent President George Manneh Weah not won the 2017 presidential election to allow Liberians to see for themselves what he could do as president, they would have discredited any good thing that any other leader would have done for the country.
He claimed that Liberians had the thought that President Weah would have put diamonds in the streets and sent their children to the moon.
“But now, y’all now see the true color of George Weah,” Dr. Whapoe said, as he criticized the president for building his own house immediately in the first six months of his presidency while Liberians were hungry.
Dr. Whapoe led a delegation from his Vision for Liberia Transformation Party to Gbah-jakeh, Bomi County on Saturday, 29 January to establish friendship with the locals, hear their issues and make interventions.
Following a traditional welcoming ceremony performed for Dr. Whapoe by the elders in the town, he agreed to work with the locals to build their mini-stadium which would help them conduct major programs, and sporting activities, among others.
Mr. Mustapha M. Foboi, the chair of the Elder Council in Gbah-jakeh, Bomi County, complained of the lack of social benefit for residents of the area where Sime Darby had operated its palm plantation before the company left the country.
But he said the elders in Gbah – jakeh believe that they have found someone who has the canoe, the ship and helicopter to rescue them from the water so that they cannot die.
Mr. Foboi said words were inadequate to express the love they have for Dr. Whapoe, pledging that they will work with him as their son.https://thenewdawnliberia.com/whapoe-fires-salvos-at-pyj-gongloe/
