The National Elections Commission's persistent failure to honor court rulings has raised troubling questions about respect for the rule of law, accountability in public institutions and the government's commitment to settling verified domestic debts.
On Aug. 20, 2025, the Commercial Court of Liberia took the extraordinary step of shutting down the headquarters of the National Elections Commission after the electoral body failed to comply with a court order to pay a local vendor, M-Tosh Prints Media, for services rendered years earlier. The closure was not only a legal sanction but a public rebuke, underscoring mounting judicial frustration with NEC's refusal to settle the same debt that has now produced multiple rulings against it.
The dispute dates back to 2019, when M-Tosh supplied materials to NEC for a legislative by-election. According to court records, the materials were delivered, used and acknowledged by the Commission. Yet payment never followed.
On Dec. 31, 2025, Commercial Court Judge Eva Mappy ruled that NEC was liable to pay M-Tosh US$96,000 for materials delivered in 2019. That judgment came on top of an earlier ruling by the same court ordering NEC to pay US$150,000, representing another portion of the debt owed to the vendor.
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Together, the two rulings establish NEC's liability at US$246,000, excluding court costs.
Rather than comply, NEC sought relief from the Supreme Court, filing an appeal. While the Commercial Court granted the appeal, it declined to issue a stay order exempting NEC from immediate compliance. Instead, the court ordered NEC to deposit the judgment amounts into an escrow account pending final determination by the Supreme Court.
That order, according to an unimpeachable court official and the vendor, has not been obeyed.
To date, NEC has not publicly disclosed, nor has it informed M-Tosh, that any portion of the judgment sums has been placed into escrow. The failure to comply has deepened concerns that the Commission is selectively ignoring binding judicial directives, even as it continues to administer elections and manage public funds.
The controversy has also intersected with broader government efforts to clean up domestic arrears.
A recent audit by the General Auditing Commission listed M-Tosh among vendors eligible for domestic debt settlement. Acting on the audit findings, the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning wrote to NEC requesting verification and confirmation of the debt owed to M-Tosh, particularly since NEC itself had earlier requested that the ministry settle the obligation on its behalf.
In a letter dated Oct. 24, 2025, Finance Minister Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan asked NEC to confirm a claim of US$171,105 submitted by M-Tosh. The ministry verified US$150,000 as the principal amount owed by NEC, along with US$21,105 in court costs.
However, the Finance Ministry informed NEC that there was no fiscal allotment in the 2025 budget to settle the debt centrally. It therefore recommended that NEC pay the vendor directly through its own operational budget.
Despite the verification and recommendation, NEC has not paid the money, according to findings by The Liberian Investigator.
As the Commercial Court prepares to issue a bill of costs requiring NEC to deposit both the US$150,000 and the US$96,000 into an escrow account for M-Tosh, the Commission has issued a press statement that has further muddied the waters.
In the statement, NEC claimed the court ruled that M-Tosh failed to provide sufficient evidence to support a claim of US$877,000. That figure, however, does not appear in the Dec. 31, 2025 judgment delivered by Judge Mappy.
Court official contacted by The Liberian Investigator said NEC's interpretation of the ruling is erroneous and misleading. According to the court, the forthcoming bill of costs will explicitly demand NEC's compliance with the orders to deposit the two separate amounts -- US$96,000 and US$150,000 -- into escrow for settlement of the debt owed to M-Tosh Prints Media.
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Legal analysts say the Commission's conduct sets a dangerous precedent.
"When a constitutional body repeatedly disobeys court orders, it weakens the authority of the judiciary and signals to other institutions that compliance is optional," one legal expert said. "That is not how a democracy governed by law should function."
The August 20, 2025 shutdown of NEC's headquarters remains a stark reminder of the escalating standoff. For many observers, it symbolizes not just a contractual dispute, but a deeper governance failure -- one in which a key national institution appears unwilling to submit itself to the same legal standards it expects citizens and political actors to respect.
