Heritage (Monrovia)
30 December 2011
The former Public Information Director at the National Elections Commission (NEC), Mr. Bobby Livingstone, says he was dismissed because of his past political affiliation.
Mr. Livingstone described the former Chairman of the NEC, Mr. James M. Fromayan’s decision to dismiss him without any investigation “as a political witch-hunt that was wrapped in an anti-regime falsehood and theory of conspiracy”.
In a press release issued in Monrovia Wednesday, Mr. Livingstone said that while Mr. Fromayan boasts of being a former founding member of the Liberia Peoples’ Party(LPP), he presents a caricature of those who have had past link with the National Patriotic Party(NPP) as if he Fromayan has a higher political rectitude or better educational gradation than those who have affiliated with the NPP before.
Mr. Livingstone asserts: “Those, who Mr. Fromayan and others are constructing anti-regime discourse about, are some of the most qualified and well educated Liberians who should not continue to suffer exclusion because of this outdated false theory.”
The Former NEC PI Director Livingstone maintains that he committed no crime and it is wrong for him to suffer persecution in his own country simply because of past political association.
According to him, it is a travesty of justice for anyone to brand him as an agent of a political party when he is not a member of any political party and no evidence of wrong doing has been adduced.
Mr. Livingstone says Mr. Fromayan whom he says boasts of being in the struggle for justice, equality and democracy, has no evidence to malign his hard earned reputation in an incident which clearly unravels a case of administrative negligence.
“To sacrifice Bobby under a former NPP link orthodoxy and construct anti- Unity Party as a way of validating my dismissal is a falsehood we are prepared to expose and fight to its demise. Mr. Fromayan must be prepared for this battle or he must recant,” he averred.
“To peddle with cheap anti regime narrative at this time and use same to deny me the means of livelihood without any due process robs Fromayan of the accolade of a democratic freedom fighter that he claims to wear,” he further averred.
A case of glaring injustice, Mr. Livingstone claims, is that subsequent to Mr. Fromayan’s resignation, he continues to ride his official vehicle and receives all his benefits from the NEC. Yet he (Livingstone) has been stripped of all NEC assets and denied his benefits, precedent to the dismissal including the payment of his October 2011 salary.
Mr. Livingstone says he owes no apology for his past political affiliation.
He points out that he who alleges must prove, emphasizing that the burden has shifted to Mr. Fromayan to produce evidence of any wrong that he (Livingstone) has committed.
“My wrongful dismissal and the attending indictment by Fromayan and the current acts of intimidation being perpetrated against me will never compel me to compromise the principles of truth, justice, fair play, rule of law embedded in my character and to become a sycophant. I only want to bring to the attention of the state actors the case of the violation of the fundamental right of a Liberian citizen and the use of propaganda to deny him livelihood and the pursuit of happiness by a bigwig under the pretext of close links with the President. If it were wrong yesterday, it cannot be right today,” Mr. Livingstone concluded.
In another development, Mr. Livingstone has said the recent violent protest action by vacation students has typified the urgency for a new socialization program for Liberian youths.
Mr. Bobby Livingstone said while he condemns in strong terms acts of banditry and hooliganism by some of the vacation students, the recent incident signals the need for a partnership to be forged between government and private entities to provide vital alternatives that would help mitigate the spiraling wave of violence and lawless which has become a dominant behavioral pattern amongst young people.
Mr. Livingstone, a media, development practitioner and recent graduate for the Louis Arthur Grimes School of Law, noted that the idea of job creation is a laudable initiative by the government and must be allowed to manifest into tangible outcomes for the target groups.
According to him, a more comprehensive and sustainable social safety net that tackles the question of livelihood for the vulnerable people will erect a platform for the reordering of the socio political landscape.
The former NEC PI Director said the recent move by the government resonates with his ‘Peace, Happiness and Prosperity for Liberians’ (PHPL) logic, a strategy for national cohesion through income generation and distribution.
He observed that many Liberian youths are unskilled, unattended to and hungry, a condition that can be traced as one of the deficits of an incomprehensive DDRR program, which the current government inherited. As a way of salvaging this situation, Livingstone proposed that a small team of technocrats be pulled as a secretariat that will design a well-structured and sustained program to help contribute to the productive engagement of vulnerable groups, mainly young people through different types of community service activities.
Mr. Livingstone said the recent vacation job scheme was overshadowed by individuals who were more interested in using the exercise as a locus for reaping political capital; and as a consequence failed to put in place an organized system of budgeting, recruitment of the student workers and their subsequent payment. However, he added that the overarching goal of providing work for the youth is still germane and will go a long way to help the students solve some pressing financial burdens.
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