Bestman In Fools’ Paradise 

One principal participant in the numerous confusions that topped the activities of the Liberia Football Association (LFA) for the past four years is the one now engaged in a smear campaign of shifting blames for failing to perform his roles as Vice President for Administration.

Apparently for the sake of being accommodated on the Musa Bility bandwagon, a person who is supposed to be the direct head of the LFA secretariat as per his term of reference, is now the individual bent on claiming that the very body he serves does not have accounting principles to safeguard its financial records. Unfortunately, Mr. Bestman, being an accountant who worked for many years at the Ministry of Finance, knows these ills but could not ratify them for the last four years probably in order to use them as campaign tool. The failure on the part of an insider like Mr. Bestman with all his financial expertise to ensure that the LFA adapt the relevant accounting measures and as well account to its members should be something that is worth condemnation to the highest degree.

Throwing baseless accusations on the innocents in order to secure votes should not be the order of the day for Mr. Bestman as his rivals could term his current attitude as scare tactics. What a lie is it for the LFA Vice President for Administration to declare that he made frantic efforts in formulating an accounting manual that the LFA President declined to make functional. No one will dare believe Mr. Bestman. After all, he had four long years to make all these disclosures but to no avail. The only frantic efforts he made were to undermine Cllr. Wesley all because she defeated him in 2001 and later crushed his ally Siaka A. Sheriff in 2006.

It is regrettable for Bestman to voice out that he is being blamed for the “underperformance” of Cllr. Wesley’s administration when he did not have a personal platform but rather operated under that of the LFA President. By the assertion, the Black Stars chief has now taken proportional representation to the local football governing body. But let him not mislead voters in that during the campaign of 2006, every candidate, Mr. Bestman being no exception, was legally allowed to make all the big promises available to be made. No poor excuse should come from Mr. Bestman now because he did not run on Cllr. Wesley’s ticket to become the second in command. He was individually elected like the rest of the football hierarchy.

Four years ago, he supported Sheriff on the basis that the latter had enough money to rule the LFA, only for his man to see defeat at the end of the day. Now Musa Bility is about to get his share of Pennoh Bestman’s deceits. It is an open secret that Bility’s oil money is what the likes of Mr. Bestman are eyeing even though knowing fully well that the Watanga president is not the savior of Liberian football.                           

As goodness would have it, Mr. Bestman is fully aware that sponsorship is what has eluded local soccer from time in memorial. He should now be in the business of stating what he did in that direction as a man with influence and contacts other than expressing that Mr. Bility has a better plan to attract sponsorship and smoothly transform the LFA from its current stage. Before even presenting Bility as the football messiah now coming to redeem the game with sponsorship, let him state what the good examples are there for his newfound partner to show at Watanga, a club that is highly unrecognizable.   

Words are just inadequate to express how Mr. Bestman is finding his campaign sting in one of the most competitive elections in the history of Liberian football.    

Now a reasonable football commentator can arrive at the conclusion that Mr. Bestman has seen the going to be tough for his reelection drive with the likes of Garmondeh Karnga, Sekou Konneh and Musa Shannon going against him. Thus, the only medium through which he can find an escape route for the many questions being asked about his decision to contest again is by putting up flimsy defenses.

Mr. Bestman has forgotten so soon that of the three leaders of the LFA, he is the one only who committed the grave act of abandoning the LFA to seek gravy at the Roberts International Airport (RIA). He has also forgotten that he kissed the Bible in order to protect the statutes of the LFA four years ago at the Monrovia City Hall when soccer legend George Oppong Manneh Weah served as the installing officer.

If Bestman wants to be a hero in the midst of the serious challenge that is before his very eyes, then it is about time that he gathers sufficient reasons to justify why he chose to join LFA President Wesley and Adolph Lawrence, the LFA Vice President, to seek continuity. Indeed, it is the constitutional rights of Mr. Bestman to run as a defending champion in the race for the Vice President for Administration position. Notwithstanding, there is no need for him to find scapegoat otherwise most of his precious time will go towards giving excuses here and there. Time is sufficient in his favor to tell electorates why he should still sit next to the President of the LFA.

It is about time that Bestman tell electorates what he has done during the past four years. The days of rhetorics have no place to occupy in the football political waves that are blowing. With the March 20 date for elections fast approaching, the rest of the contestants are gaining grounds, with Mr. Bestman in fool’s paradise