足球明星和副總統在利比里亞總統選舉中領先
Football icon George Weah and Vice President Joseph Bokai are the early front runners in Liberia's presidential election results, but election officials said only a third of the ballots had been counted on Thursday, three days after the vote.
Voters cast their ballots on Tuesday, marking the West African nation's first smooth transition of power from one democratically elected leadership to another in more than 70 years.
The Liberty Party, however, wants election authorities to stop counting the votes, citing voting irregularities and fraud.
Liberians went to polls to choose the successor to Nobel Peace laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Africa's first female elected head of state, who is stepping down after serving two six-year terms, as mandated by Liberia's constitution.
With 20 people running for the West African nation's highest office, analysts do not believe anyone will win over 50 percent of the vote, forcing a runoff in November.
Only one woman is vying for the presidency, while another woman, Jewel Howard Taylor, is the running mate of George Weah. Taylor is the ex-wife of former president and warlord Charles Taylor, who is serving a 50-year prison sentence for war crimes in connection with the conflict in neighboring Sierra Leone two decades ago.
Sirleaf has led Liberia through a period of peace in the aftermath of a 14-year civil war that ended in 2003. But the country remains plagued by corruption, and is still trying to recover from the Ebola crisis that killed 5,000 people in 2014 and 2015.足球巨星維阿和副總統博阿凱在利比里亞總統選舉初步選票統計中暫時領先。不過，選舉官員說，到投票後第三天的星期四爲止，只清點了三分之一的選票。
利比里亞選民星期二投票。這次選舉是這個西非國家70多年來第一次從一個民選總統向下一個民選總統的平穩權力交接。
利比里亞自由黨要求選舉當局停止清點選票，聲稱選舉中有舞弊和欺詐。
利比里亞選民要挑選接替非洲第一位民選女性國家元首瑟利夫的人。瑟利夫擔任了兩任總統，一次任期6年。依照利比里亞憲法，她不能第三次連任。
總共有20名候選人角逐總統的職位。分析人士認爲，不可能有任何人贏得50%以上的選票，因此必須在11月舉行決選。
這次參選的只有一名女性候選人。另一名女性泰勒擔任球星維阿的競選搭檔。泰勒是前總統和軍閥查爾斯·泰勒的前妻。查爾斯·泰勒被判20年前參與鄰國塞拉利昂的衝突，犯有戰爭罪，正在獄中服50年的徒刑。
利比里亞14年的內戰2003年結束後，瑟利夫在和平時期擔任總統。但是利比里亞仍然存在嚴重的腐敗問題，並正努力從2014年和2015年造成5000人喪生的埃博拉危機中復甦。
