On October 11, Jeremiah Whapoe, the presidential candidate for the Vision for Liberia Transformation Party (VOLT), during a press conference claimed that the National Elections Commission had replaced his party’s name with the Grassroot Development Movement (GDM) on the Presidential record of the count at voting precinct code 304005.
Claim
His exact words were: “The name here, instead of it being Vision for Liberia Transformation Party, it’s Grassroots Democratic Movement. It’s unusual for two parties to get the same name and participate in the election and it’s very unusual for you to copy and paste political parties name and that’s exactly what election commission did. They ‘omitted’ our party name from there, but they carried my image on the ballot.”
Additionally, several Liberians have taken to Facebook claiming that the acronym “GDM” representing the Grassroots Development Movement appeared twice alongside the pictures of Presidential Candidates Edward Appleton and Dr. Jeremiah Whapoe on the presidential record of the count.
Rating Justification
To verify the claim, we reviewed copies of the presidential record of the count from precinct code 304005 (Emmanuel Semgbloh Junior High Schol in District #9, Montserrado County) and Precinct #30397 at the All God’s Children High School in District #9, Montserrado County.
On these presidential record of the count sheets also known by many as the tally sheet, Candidate Appleton, who is at #1 on the ballot paper represents Grassroots Development Movement or “GDM”, But also Dr. Jeremiah Whapoe has “GDM” in front of his name instead of “VOLT.”
On Wednesday, October 11, Journalist Lincoln Peters of New Dawn during NEC’s daily press briefing (at 20:45) inquired about the reason for the appearance of “GDM” twice on the tally sheet.
The NEC Chairlady, Madam Davidetta Browne-Lansanah admitted that the NEC has not noticed but promised to provide an explanation to the public. In case we get a response from NEC, we will update this report.
Conclusion
Based on our review of the presidential record of the count of tally sheets, we concluded that Dr. Jeremiah Whapoe’s claim is correct. The acronym “GDM” was printed in front of Dr. Whapoe instead of “VOLT” – the party he represented in the presidential election.
Local Voices Liberia, in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme, has implemented the iVerify Liberia system with the objective of strengthening capacities to address threats to information integrity, especially in view of the upcoming 2023 elections, to ensure all Liberian citizens have access to credible, reliable and verified information, everywhere and at all times.
This initiative is funded by Irish Aid, Embassy of Sweden in Monrovia, European Union Delegation in Liberia and the United Nations Peacebuilding Fund. The donors have no say in the production of this fact check report.
