Presidential aspirant, Mr. Simeon Freeman has warned here the opposition leaders are threading on a dangerous path by antagonizing each.
The Movement for Progressive Change (MPC) leader said Monday, 17 July 2023 that the opposition community should be collaborating for an opposition victory rather than antagonizing each other.
The businessman-turned-politician appeared on local broadcaster Prime FM in Monrovia Monday to denounce the division within the opposition community.
Mr. Freeman warned that the division among the opposition is creating more vulnerability and doing more harm to the opposition, while the ruling establishment is being left unraveled.
Most frustratingly, Mr. Freeman said, all efforts he initiated to employ a NATO style of friendship among oppositions to challenge the ruling party through a common interest, have all fallen on infertile ground.
“We are creating vulnerability and doing ourselves harm. Our people are … disappointed in us,” said Mr. Freeman.
“Party A is attacking Party B in the opposition and that’s not called for. As a means of having a formidable opposition force, we decided to introduce a NATO style of partnership wherein we will all hold together and have [a] common interest,” Mr. Freeman continued.
He said from the beginning, most of the parties, about 22 parties from the opposition attended the first meeting, but out of a sudden, all just broke down.
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“We lost that opportunity because we are not talking to each other. Our concern in the opposition mostly has been who becomes president and who becomes vice president rather than how do we hold together to have a better chance at the poll,” he lamented.
Mr. Freeman explained that a NATO style would have made the opposition support each other.
But he said they lost out and he doesn’t think they will get that opportunity back.
As it stands, Mr. Freeman noted, the opposition community does not know the number of ballot papers that were brought into the country.
According to him, these are the kinds of issues that are supposed to be spoken about through a united front.
“But if one party tries to raise that issue now, you will even be attacked by people within the very opposition,” he lamented.
“As an inter-party infrastructure, we would have done better. That is, you touch one you touch all as it is in the case of NATO. But we left [it] all undone,” he pointed out.
As he prepares to contest the ensuing 2023 presidential and legislative elections, Mr. Freeman, unlike many of the aspirants, has a different development platform far from building road infrastructure.
According to him, the building of roads would just be very difficult if not impossible to achieve on the heel of the meagre resources that the country has.
“A World Bank study has shown that it will take us up to three to six billion to pave major roads in Liberia, so for me, good maintenance of the roads would be better, while we create capacity for the people to get jobs,” he argued.
The businessman stated that you cannot tell the people that you will put mountains in the cloud and build houses in the sky where there is no ladder to take them.
“All we need to do is that we must work towards improving living standards. We need to [do] further assessments of our leaders to make the right decision,” he added.
Mr. Freeman said he is the man to trust this country with because he has a well-articulated vision.
