MONROVIA, Montserrado – Sinoe’s Senator Augustine Chea has filed a complaint against Sen. Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence for prioritizing the newly-elected Senator Darius Dillon over him in assigning office space in the Capitol Building.

Chea said Karnga-Lawrence, the Senate chair on the Committee on Rules, Order, and Administration, gave Dillon an office in the new Capitol Building wing when Chea has been at the Senate for over eight months without an office. Meanwhile, Dillon was inducted into office approximately three weeks ago.

Chea said he had been squatting in a conference room before Sen. Saah Joseph of Montserrado allowed him to operate within his office.

The Sinoe senator said Karnga-Lawrence has always downplayed his request to be assigned an office.

“It was no matter of urgency to get me an office as chairperson on Rules, Order, and Administration, but of course it became a matter of urgency to get Sen. Dillon an office,” Chea wrote to the Senate president pro tempore, Albert Chie.

Chea, who is the chair on the Committee on Posts and Telecommunications, said he had a conversation with Chie a week after the funeral of the late Sen. Edward Dagoseh about taking over Dagoseh’s office. However, Chea said the pro tempore told him that there was a policy to assign offices in the new annex by rank in leadership.

“Is that one of the ranking senators who moved in the late Dagoseh’s office?” Chea said in response to Dillon’s office assignment. “I’m flabbergasted! What is going on?”

Chea asked that Karnga-Lawrence be made to “rescind the decision to give the office to Senator Dillon.”

Karnga-Lawrence belongs to the same political party as Dillon, Liberty Party.

In July 2018, two newly constructed annexes of the Capitol Building were dedicated. The US$12.9 million construction was undertaken by the People’s Republic of China as a gift to the people and government of Liberia, amid the lack of adequate office spaces for lawmakers and their staff.

The Senate Press Bureau noted that the two new annexes contain 40 offices on the wing of the House of Representatives and 20 offices for the Senate. According to the release, the annexes also include an additional chamber for the House and the Senate, in addition to a joint chamber and offices for the staff of the legislature.

Featured photo by Zeze Ballah