After Winning Election, Liberian President Promises to Work With Opponents

Scott Stearns | Monrovia

Photo: Reuters

An election official checks the voter registration card for incumbent leader Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf during presidential elections at her home village of Fefee outside the capital Monrovia November 8, 2011.

Nearly complete results from Liberia's presidential run-off show incumbent Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf winning an easy re-election in a poll that was boycotted by her opponent over allegations of vote fraud. President Sirleaf says she will include opponents in a new government.

Winning more than 90 percent of the vote so far, Sirleaf says she will work to bring the country together after a contentious election process marred by a boycotted poll and a deadly clash between riot police and opposition demonstrators.

“We believe that Liberia will find its way, that we will certainly reach out to all Liberians from all political parties and ensure them that they have a stake in the future," she said. "Liberia belongs to all Liberians, and no one can be left behind if we want to be successful in achieving our objectives.”

The president says she will work to include opposition candidates in her new government, much as she did after her 2005 election. That includes members of Liberia's largest opposition party, the Congress for Democratic Change, or CDC.

“Going forward, we intend to reach out to all the CDC leaders," Sirleaf said. "We intend to see how they can work. As I said, we have to make sure that there is reconciliation in order to achieve our development objectives. There are elected and re-elected leaders of CDC who will be in the legislature, and we will work with them.”

The CDC party's presidential candidate, former justice minister Winston Tubman, boycotted Tuesday's run-off over allegations of tampered ballot boxes and changed vote totals in last month's first round of voting. Election observers from the Carter Center and the Economic Community of West African States say that vote was largely free and fair.

Tubman says he will not accept the results of this vote and is considering a legal challenge to the outcome. The party says voter turnout of less than 40 percent for the run-off weakens President Sirleaf's mandate for a second term, especially as more than 70 percent of voters came out for the first round.

President Sirleaf says she is confident of her mandate and believes that what her new government does to bring Liberians together will strengthen that mandate.

“What we have to do is to respond to the basic needs of the people, particularly the young, the youth who have been by-passed by education, who don't have the skills for jobs," Sirleaf said. "Our concentration and our challenge and emphasis in the first couple of years of the new administration is to focus on them. And I believe once we do that, reduce the level of poverty, that that in itself will become a binding force and a unifying force in the country.”

President Sirleaf says she will address the nation once final results are announced late Friday.