Liberian opposition seeks reconciliation after poll

Liberia's Winston Tubman said Friday he was willing to find a way to work with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf after disputed polls left the war-scarred nation more divided than ever. Africa's first female president was confirmed the victor in a run-off election, seen as a foregone conclusion after Tubman pulled out of the race and urged his supporters to boycott the polls over fears the process was rigged. The United States and election observers urged the country to accept the poll results, fearing further violence after an opposition rally on the eve of the election turned bloody as police fired on a crowd of protesters. Tubman repeated his earlier stance that his party would not recognise the results, but was "prepared to heal the wounds of this country and to unite our country." "Since Mrs Sirleaf will now claim she is the president and is recognised by the international community, we have to find a way to work with her and I believe it is not beyond our ability to find a way for that to happen." The National Elections Commission announced that with results tallied from 86.6 percent of polling stations, Sirleaf had won 90.8 percent of votes cast and Tubman nine percent. Only 37.4 percent of the country's 1.8 million registered voters cast their ballots, with many believed to have stayed away due to the boycott call and violence on the eve of the poll. "I think the real telling thing is the low turnout," Tubman told AFP and French radio in an interview in his garden early Friday. "We have shown that this party doesn't have the support. ... What they couldn't conceal were the empty polling stations." Nobel Peace Prize co-winner Sirleaf is facing a tough second term with her nation more divided than ever after the tainted election process. She has extended a hand of friendship to opposition parties, saying she hoped to put together an inclusive government as she had when she was elected in 2005, just two years after the end of a brutal 14-year conflict. "I will reach out to all the presidential candidates," Sirleaf told reporters in Monrovia. Tubman, lying in a hammock on his verandah as rain poured outside, said his party was "not for sale", while recognising that he would have to work with the president for the sake of the country. "We're in this political business because we have a deeper ambition to unite our country, to heal the wounds ... and that must go on," he said, adding that he was trying to convince the youth in his party that peace is the most important thing for Liberia, and not personal ambition. "A lot of our young people want to be on the streets now, it is taking a lot for us to try and restrain them," he said. The poll had been billed as a chance for the war-scarred nation to cement its fragile democracy and hard-won peace eight years after the end of a long and savage conflict which left some 250,000 people dead. The Carter Center's 52-person observer mission said the vote was "conducted transparently", though it added: "Regrettably, the election was marred by an opposition boycott, violence on the eve of the election, and low voter turnout." The United States urged Liberians to "peacefully accept" the results. "We're obviously concerned and expressed those concerns about pre-election violence, and we continue to monitor very closely the situation on the ground," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters. Sirleaf said she would establish an independent commission to investigate Monday's shooting, after police admitted that live rounds were fired as tensions soared between protesters and security forces. Journalists saw two bodies with gunshot wounds to the head following Monday's incident and Tubman says up to eight were killed. Sirleaf said that while her first term focused on establishing peace and development, her second would tackle problems such as job creation, with unemployment running at a staggering 80 percent.