Parliament of Liberia has caught fire for the second time in a week. This happened after a power tussle made an attempt to remove the speaker. The Police officers have offered $5,000 reward for anyone with information about the fire.
Reportedly, Liberia’s House of Representatives Speaker denied to get involved in a huge fire at the legislature of West African nation.
Speaker Jonathan Fonati Koffa was among the ones who were interrogated by the police and after the Capital building was set alight.
As per the sources, no-one was in the building at the time of the fire but the authorities have launched an investigation and offered a $5,000 (approx. £3,900) as reward for anyone with more information.
Koffa told that he had spent a total of nine ours at the police station but insisted that he was just there to accompany a colleague representative ‘Frank Saah Foko’.
The fire occurred on Wednesday morning, last week. This all happened just a day after plans to remove Koffa from his speaker role sparked a tense protest. Several demonstrators which included an aide to former President George Weah were arrested during the protest.
Following the fire, that saw thick black smoke rising above the capital Monrovia, police said that they had brought Koffa, Foko and two others in for questioning.
Notably, Police Chief Gregory Coleman collected reference from a Facebook post that Koffa made on his official social media handle, during the protests and asked that the speaker must explain it.
Koffa said that he would give a written statement about the post but he had not actually been questioned. He mentioned that the fire could have broken out for any number of reasons.
According to Koffa, if it was arson that would have been a horrible thing and added that he had never been and would never be associated with that kind of violence.
He highlighted that an old part of the building was damaged by the fire and a contractor had previously warned officials that they were sitting on a time-bomb. Koffa also called for a neutral and international investigation related to the fire incident.
Liberia’s House of Representatives were beset by a power struggle in which a fraction of lawmakers claims to have removed and replaced Koffa as speaker. Another group has resisted the action and called it unconstitutional. The ruling Supreme Court has failed to solve the internal dispute.