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Liberian President Weah said that he would contest for a second term in October, rejecting mounting criticism against him as a head of state out of touch with a population facing steep price rises and food shortages
Liberian President Weah said that he would contest for a second term in October, rejecting mounting criticism against him as a head of state out of touch with a population facing steep price rises and food shortages. Weah, a former international footballer of repute, has been the president of Liberia for the last six years.
The president also defended his first term, saying that the state of the nation was strong, stable, peaceful, and secure. The election will take place in October this year. The West African country has still to recover from back-to-back civil wars between 1989 and 2003, which caused a number of casualties.
Liberia is one of the poorest countries in Africa and has been badly affected by the outbreak of the Ebola pandemic. The nation of five million people has been hit hard by the consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine also. It is one of the countries with the lowest per capita income. According to the World Bank, people live on less than US$1.90 a day.
Weah came to power in 2018 after winning an October 2017 election. He acquired an iconic status after becoming the first and only African to win football’s most prestigious individual award, the Ballon d’Or, in 1995. Weah’s preoccupation with football and the undue projection of his footballer son, who represented the US team in the last Qatar world cup, did not go well with the Liberians who are engulfed by poverty and destitution. Despite those imponderables, the President during the football world cup was mostly out of the country to watch football matches, particularly when his son was playing for the US team.
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https://trendsnafrica.com/shortage-of-rice-causing-panic-buying-in-liberia/
Liberia was founded as a colony in 1822 by former US slaves. The country has become a republic 25 years later to earn the coveted position as Africa’s first republic.