Filed in by Olando Testimony Zeongar – 0776819983/0880-361116/life2short4some@yahoo.com
Monrovia – The social media account of Liberia’s popular online television, KMTV, has been reportedly hacked and an unauthorized ‘victory claim’ in the favor of the ruling Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) broadcast live for about 20 minutes.
The management of KMTV has issued a disclaimer, stating, “Twenty minutes ago, we noticed that our system was hacked, which allowed the hackers to manipulate broadcast captions.”
The hackers manipulated the caption of an existing video on KMTV online site, by inserting another caption of their choice which reads: “CDC Congratulates Abraham Darius Dillon, as District #15 Falls to Ruling Party.
The online news outlet has refuted the hackers’ claims, informing its thousands of viewers and followers across the world that such reportage dose not represent the management of KMTV, and that the actual caption for the broadcast is rather “Official Turning Over Ceremony of Atty. Teklo Gribsby as Chairman LINCSA.”
The management of KMTV has therefore, apologized for the incident and disclosed that it is investigating the situation that led to the hacking of the online television outfit’s system.
KMTV thanked its viewers and followers and clarified that it remains a business entity and not a political institution.
The news of KMTV’s account being hacked comes at the time Liberia is nervy, as many await the National Elections Commission (NEC) to release the official results of the just-ended Montserrado senatorial and District #15 by-elections, amid post-election victory claims by both the ruling CDC and the collaborating opposition political parties.
Officials and supporters as well as candidates of the both sides continue to make victory claims, with CDC chairman Mulbah Morlu claiming that his party’s candidates, Paulita C.C. Wie and Abu B. Kamara were in commanding lead over opposition candidates Abe Darius Dillon and Telia Urey.
“Reports in our possession show an authoritative lead in the two by-elections and we will not follow the opposition’s quest to claim the victory or to undermine the truism of tally sheets signed by poll workers and records of the National Elections Commission,” Morlu said at a press conference a day after the elections.
“While we recognize that the senatorial election shows a margin in our favor, as we have tallied 90% of the votes cast, we can also boastfully say that District 15 is overpoweringly won by our candidate, Abu Bana Kamara, after tallying 100% of the votes cast,” Morlu added.
On the other hand, Steve Zargo, chairman of Liberity Party, one of the four collaborsting parties, told a news conference Tuesday that their candidates, Dillon and Telia were in an “irreversible lead.”
Zargo staed that that results in the possession of the collaborating parties show that their senatorial candidate Dillon had a margin of 20,000 difference between him and the ruling party’s candidate, Wie.
He also disclosed that results in the four collaborating political parties’ possession put their candidate Telia Urey in the lead against her main contender, Abu Kamara of the governing CDC in the District #15 by-election.
“Our technical team is currently monitoring and tally sheets available to the collaborating political parties show that the two candidates on the ticket of the collaborating parties are in an irreversible lead,” Zargo said.
“We thank the people of Montserrado County for turning out to make history by defeating CDC in what is believed to be their back yard. We will jealously protect our ballot,” said Zargo, who called on the international community to be aware of what he called an “attempt by the ruling party to thwart results.”
