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Liberia’s First Election Since the Civil War: High
Turnout and High Hopes
Al-Jazeera Reporter Yousri Fouda on His Interviews with Al
Qaeda Members and the Growth of al-Jazeera
Democrats Chant “Shame” in Congress After Bills
Pass Benefiting Big Businesses
Liberia’s First Election Since the Civil War:
High Turnout and High Hopes
Liberia holds its first elections since the end of the 14-year
civil war two years ago, drawing 1.3 million voters. The first
official results show former soccer player George Weah and
former World Bank economist Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf as the leading
figures in the race. We speak with Liberian Emira Woods, of
the Institute for Policy Studies, about voters' hopes for
the country's future and challenges stemming from the past.
[includes rush
transcript]
Yesterday, Liberia held its first elections since a 14-year
civil war ended two years ago. Former professional soccer
player George Weah and the Harvard trained former World Bank
economist Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, have emerged as the frontrunners
among 22 candidates for the presidency. If Johnson-Sirleaf
were to win she would become Africa’s first female president.
The first official election results taken from a fraction
of polling stations declare Weah ahead in the race. He has
27.5% of the nearly 35,000 votes counted and Johnson-Sirleaf
has 16.7%, according to the BBC. It may take several days
until the full results are in from the 3,000 polling stations
because there are few paved roads, no electrical grid and
no nationwide telephone system in Liberia.
Modern Liberia was founded by freed slaves from the United
States in 1822. Under the rule of former President Charles
Taylor, Liberia was immersed in a long, brutal civil war and
in conflict around the region. An estimated half-a-million
Liberians fled into exile, another half-million were displaced
inside the country and a quarter of a million died.
More than 1.3 million people registered to vote in this election,
which represents the possibility of a more stable future for
the country. Voters waited overnight and in the blaring sun
in order to cast their ballots and international observers
praised the process as free of violence or irregularities.
On the way to casting their ballots, the two leading candidates
expressed optimism about the future of their country.
Al-Jazeera Reporter Yousri Fouda on His Interviews
with Al Qaeda Members and the Growth of al-Jazeera
Investigative reporter Yousri Fouda from Al-Jazeera, the
Arabic satellite television station, talks about his interviews
with the al Qaeda members behind 9/11 and the danger al-Jazeera
correspondents risk in light of the U.S. bombings of networks
stations, the killing of correspondents, and the jailing of
al-Jazeera reporters. Fouda speaks about the international
attitude towards the network as it grows. [includes rush
transcript]
Their offices were bombed twice in Afghanistan.Their Baghdad
correspondent was killed In Iraq. One of their top correspondents
was sentenced to seven years in prison after he was convicted
of collaborating with al Qaeda. Their reporter was arrested
en route to a summit in Crawford. Their New York correspondents
were thrown off the floors of the New York Stock Exchange
and NASDAQ. We’re talking about al-Jazeera, the Arabic
satellite television station based in Qatar.
Al Jazeera’s programming has been seen as controversial
by some in Washington ever since it began broadcasting eight
years ago. The network has since grown into a CNN of the Arabic
world reaching up to 55 million viewers. They are soon launching
a children’s channel, a sports channel, a documentary
channel and an English-language channel.
- Yousri Fouda, Senior investigative reporter at al Jazeera
and host of "Top Secret," one of al Jazeera’s
most popular shows. He is the network’s London bureau
chief where he is based. He is co-author of the book "Masterminds
of Terror: The Truth Behind the Most Devastating Attack
the World Has Ever Seen."
Democrats Chant “Shame” in Congress After
Bills Pass Benefiting Big Businesses
In the weeks after Hurricane Katrina, legislation in the
Senate and House has been criticized as beneficial to corporations
while sidelining the victims of the disaster. Recently, House
Republican leaders pushed through a bill to make it easier
for oil companies to build new domestic refineries. [includes
rush
transcript]
The bill passed 212-210 but only because the house leadership
extended the vote by 40 minutes during which time two Republicans
switched their vote. The legislation will streamline government
permits for refineries, open federal lands for future refinery
construction, weaken environmental protections, and offer
subsidies to build refineries even though oil companies are
making record profits. The bill would also limit the power
of community or citizen groups because if they filed a lawsuit
to challenge the location of a refinery they would be required
to pay an oil company’s legal costs whether they win
or lose the lawsuit.
In the initial vote tally, it looked as if the bill was going
down to defeat two votes shy of approval. Democrats called
for gaveling the vote closed to no avail. During the extra
40 minutes of voting House Speaker Dennis Hastert, majority
whip Roy Blunt and former Majority Leader Tom Delay all pressured
other Republicans to change their votes. After the vote, Democrat
Henry Waxman asked from the floor, "Doesn’t this
make the House a banana republic?"
The Louisiana Katrina Reconstruction Act was introduced last
month by Louisiana Senators Mary Landrieu, who is a Democrat,
and David Vitter, who is a Republican. The LA Times reported
this week that lobbyists representing transportation, energy
and other special interests dominated the panels advising
the senators in crafting the legislation. Most of the lobbying
firms are major campaign contributors and several have donated
heavily to the campaigns of Landrieu and Vitter. The bill
is estimated to cost $246 billion dollars and includes billions
of dollars of business for clients of the lobbyists. The act
has been criticized as a missed opportunity to begin creative
and equitable reconstruction of the devastated region. Keith
Ashdown of the non-partisan watchdog group, Taxpayers for
Common Sense, said that the lobbyists were exploiting the
catastrophe. “They are using Katrina to get funding
they haven’t been able to get in the past. You want
to help the region but the bill they put together has a lot
of projects that aren’t needed. This is congressional
looting at its worse.”
- John Walke, Director for the Natural Resource Defense
Council in Washington DC.
- Ivor van Heerden, Deputy Director of the Louisiana State
University Hurricane Public Health Research Center and Director
of the Center for the Study of Public Health Impacts of
Hurricanes in Baton Rouge. Van Heerden oversaw Louisiana’s
coastal restoration program as an official in the state’s
Department of Natural Resources
For a copy of today’s program, call 1 (800) 881 2359.
Our website is www.democracynow.org.
Our email address is mail@democracynow.org.
Democracy Now! is produced by Mike Burke, Sharif Abdel Kouddous,
Ana Nogueira, Elizabeth Press, Jeremy Scahill and Parvez Sharma.
Mike Di Filippo is our engineer.
Thanks also to Uri Galed, Angela Alston, Orlando Richards,
Simba Russeau, Johnny Sender, Rich Kim, Joe Murgio, John Randolph,
Chris Zucker, Karen Ranucci, Denis Moynihan, Eric Rweyemamu,
Jenny Filipazzo and Isis Phillips.
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