Published: June 27, 2026
ZWEDRU, Grand Gedeh County — Alternative National Congress political leader Alexander B. Cummings called on Liberia’s opposition parties to close ranks and confront the Unity Party government on Saturday, using his keynote address at the Congress for Democratic Change’s 22nd anniversary to press for a united front and an independent investigation into the record cocaine seizure at Roberts International Airport.
Cummings, who served as guest speaker before a crowd of partisans and opposition figures in Zwedru, framed the gathering as a turning point for a fractured opposition and argued that no single party could unseat the governing establishment alone.
“Our strength lies in opposition solidarity,” Cummings said. “The ANC, CDC, CMC, MPC, NPP, LPP, ALP, and all opposition parties together can create the change we seek for Liberia.”
He singled out the roughly US$19 million drug bust at the airport as a test of the government’s seriousness on accountability, vowing that the opposition would press the case at home and abroad.
“We must begin by demanding nothing less than an independent and transparent investigation of the recent 19 million US Dollar drug bust at the RIA, and accountability for all those found culpable,” Cummings said. “If we are serious about fighting drugs, this would be a good start.”
Cummings warned that the opposition would not allow the matter to be buried, invoking a popular Liberian expression for self-dealing. “The proliferation of drugs is no joke, and no one will be allowed to eat show on us with this case,” he said, adding that the opposition would call on friends in the international community to ensure the government “does not get away with protecting any big hand in this case.”
The ANC leader devoted much of his address to what he called the government’s failures on poverty, weak institutions and exclusion. He said over half the population suffers multidimensional poverty, that rural poverty had climbed to 81 percent, and that 50.9 percent of Liberians live below the national poverty line, even as policymakers point to economic growth and a 1.2 billion U.S. dollar national budget.
“These are not just statistics,” Cummings said. “They are the painful realities of our compatriots, the haunting cries of children who go to bed hungry, night after night, their dreams stifled before they can even begin.”
Cummings also moved to blunt criticism that his push for unity masks personal ambition, telling the gathering the cause was larger than any individual. “I hear some people say that Cummings only wants to be President,” he said. “But let me be very clear, the kind of change we seek is bigger than any one person.”
He pledged to take any role in a unified opposition effort. “If I have to be the driver or the car boy to get us to our destination of a better Liberia, I will,” Cummings said, pointing to his presence as keynote speaker as evidence of that willingness. He closed by casting the next election as a referendum on the governing party, declaring the opposition would “replace the failed Rescue Mission in 2029 and begin the mission to FIX Liberia.”
The anniversary drew a wide cross section of opposition leaders to Grand Gedeh, including Movement for Progressive Change political leader Simeon Freeman, Citizen Movement for Change political leader Musa H. Bility, All Liberian Party leader Benoni Urey and former Associate Justice Cllr. Kabineh Ja’neh, among others.
Former President George Manneh Weah, the CDC’s standard bearer, used his own remarks to thank the assembled opposition leaders and to recast the party as the engine of a returning movement. He named Cummings, Bility, Urey, Freeman and Ja’neh among those whose attendance, he said, showed “that political leaders who seek the best interest of Liberia can and must work together.”
Weah said the CDC remained a grassroots force despite electoral defeat and accused the Boakai administration of rolling back democratic gains, persecuting former officials and shielding officials tied to drug trafficking. “Liberia has turned into a narco state,” he said.
The former president tied the anniversary directly to the next presidential cycle. “The road to 2029 begins today,” Weah said, calling on partisans and the broader opposition to mobilize. “This is not the time for division. This is not the time for complacency. This is the time for mobilization.”
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