CDC declares Police 102 No.1 enemy

The opposition Congress for Democratic Change brands the Deputy Inspector-General of Police for Operations an enemy number of the party. 

By Emmanuel Wise Jipoh

Monrovia, Liberia, August 23, 2024—The former ruling Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) declared the Liberia National Police (LNP) Deputy Inspector General for Operations, Atty. J. Nelson Freeman (Unit 102), the opposition’s number one public enemy amidst tension that disrupted the normal flow of traffic along Tubman Boulevard, leading to Monrovia.

The CDC, through its secretary-general Jefferson Tamba Koijee, alleges that Deputy Inspector-General Freeman has succeeded in killing CDCians over the years but warns that the party will never condone a repeat from him.

He threatens rampage retaliation as a way of availing themselves to the Police while warning that such a reoccurrence at the CDC’s premises will be met with brutal demonstrations against the Police.

“We want to say to you ‘102’, you were successful two decades ago, you murdered our people right here, and go [went] unpunished, but today, Boakai has rewarded you.

But let me say this categorically clear to you: this is the first and the last, this will never happen again, never will the Police come and invade our territories. This is our headquarters and we are an institution, and this will be the last time you will step here, you have been declared as public enemy to each and every CDCian” Koijee declares.

Supporters of the former ruling party on Thursday, 22 August 2024, in apparent retaliation, confronted Police that had gone to support the Liberia Drug Enforcement Agency (LDEA) during a raid of alleged drug users and ghettoes behind the premises of the Congress for Democratic Change headquarters on Tubman Boulevard.

Clashes leading to a few hours of standstill erupted between the Police and partisans of the CDC after a huge number of armed Police officers entered the party compound in an enforcement measure to raid alleged drug users.

However, after several hours of commotion between the Police and protesting CDCians, calm was restored when former Representative Acarous Gray, a CDC stalwart, intervened, asking the Police to leave and promising to calm down protesting partisans.

Gray personally promised to take responsibility for any action by aggravated partisans if the Police left the party’s premises.

Before that, he had earlier issued a dead or alive warning against the Police, threatening that if the security didn’t leave, the situation could escalate.

According to him, the CDC remains a constitutional institution, so it will not condone Police invading its headquarters.

“Let me first establish it is our constitutional right to be in our headquarters, and the Police don’t have the right to invade the premises without a court order. I have asked all partisans to remain on the grounds of the headquarters. If the Police cannot leave our headquarters, they have violated our constitutional right as an institution, and we will resist them.”

Earlier, several demonstrators outside the party compound were taken into Police custody amid an unverified claim of one death.

But up to Press Time, the NEW DAWN couldn’t confirm the allegation, as there was no dead body on the scene.

However, the CDC warning against Unit 102 is in reflection of an incident during the 2011 Presidential Election, when a partisan of the party was killed on November 7, 2011, in a shooting incident at the party’s headquarters under the regime of former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Editing by Jonathan Browne