Presumptive Senator-elect for Gbarpolu County, Botoe Kanneh, expresses gratitude
Botoe Kanneh, Gbarpolu County’s presumptive Senator-elect, has hailed women rights advocates for her victory among nine male political candidates if the National Elections Commission’s final result will render her the victory.
Since former President Charles Taylor established the county, Madam Kanneh is the first female to contest in an election to become a presumed winner after contentious electoral disputes that led to the re-run of the process.
Madam Kanneh in an interview told
Daily Observer, “I could have fallen prey for the second time had it not been for those women who stood up to ensure that my victory comes to pass.”
By Hannah N. Geterminah
Some womenâs right advocacy organizations have called on President George M. Weah to exercise the political will to investigate violent circumstances surrounding the leading senatorial candidate in Gbarpolu County, Madam Botoe Kanneh, and to ensure that she participates freely in the re-run electoral process in Nomodatonau without intimidation or threat from the traditional Poro Master otherwise referred to as âCountry Devil.â
The senatorial election in Gbarpolu County is at a standstill and there is a need for re-run because a town chief of the town allegedly seized the ballot boxes and the poro master was ordered to come to town. Whenever the poro master comes to the town, women and males who are non-members are forced to be locked up in their houses as the master and members of the poro society implement whatever they are in the town for. This means that the female candidate, Kanneh Gbotoe, will not access the ballot boxes already in th