George Weah

George Weah (2019), 25th President of Liberia

George Tawlon Manneh Oppong Ousman Weah (born October 1, 1966 in Monrovia , Liberia ) has been the 25th President of Liberia since January 22, 2018, as well as a former football player .

Weah, who was named FIFA World Player of the Year in 1995 and was awarded the Ballon d'Or (European Footballer of the Year), is revered like a folk hero in Liberia. He is considered one of the best African soccer players. He had his greatest successes during the 1990s in Europe with clubs such as AS Monaco , Paris Saint-Germain and AC Milan .

He later used his popularity politically and founded the Liberian Congress for Democratic Change (CDC). In 2005 he ran for the office of Liberian President for the first time, but failed against his opponent Ellen Sirleaf . On his second attempt in 2017 , he finally won against Joseph Boakai.

Origin and youth

Weah is a member of the Kru ethnic group . He grew up with his grandmother in Clara Town, a slum near the capital Monrovia . Although Liberia is considered one of the poorest countries in Africa , he was able to attend school and then found work as a technician at the national telephone company . Football was his passion early on: first as a street footballer in his neighborhood, later as an amateur player with Mighty Barolle and the Invincible Eleven . His siblings Moses and Wolo were also national soccer players for Liberia .

Soccer

George Weah
Personnel
Surname	George Tawlon Manneh Oppong Ousman Weah
birthday	October 1, 1966
place of birth	Monrovia ,  Liberia
size	184 cm
position	striker
Juniors
Years	station
1981-1984	Young Survivors Clareton
1984-1985	Bongrange Company
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
1985	Bongrange Company	2 0(1)
1986	Mighty Barolle	10 0(7)
1986-1987	Invincible Eleven	23 (24)
1987	Africa Sports National
1987-1988	Tonnerre Yaoundé	18 (14)
1988-1992	AS Monaco	103 (47)
1988-1990	AS Monaco B	6 0(3)
1992-1995	Paris Saint-Germain	96 (32)
1993-1994	Paris Saint-Germain B.	1 0(0)
1995-2000	AC Milan	114 (46)
2000	→  Chelsea FC  (loan)	11 0(3)
2000	Manchester City	7 0(1)
2000-2001	Olympique Marseille	19 0(5)
2001-2003	Al-Jazira Club	38 (28)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals) 2
1988-2018	Liberia	61 (22)
Stations as a trainer
Years	station
2008	Valiente Koriyama Tokyo (Japanese sixth division)
1 Only league games are given. Status: end of career 2 Status: end of career

Club career

Africa (1986 to 1988)

At the age of twenty, Weah made his debut in the first division for Mighty Barolle in 1986, later he joined the Invincible Eleven and won the championship with both teams. In 1987 he was the top scorer with 24 goals in 23 games. In the same year Weah moved to Cameroon to Tonnerre Yaoundé , one of the strongest teams on the continent, and aroused the interest of top European clubs there.

France (1988 to 1995)

After a year in Cameroon, the center forward moved to Europe for AS Monaco in 1988. His new coach Arsène Wenger said of the newcomer: “Weah was the big surprise. He was the chocolate bunny that the little boy finds in the garden at Easter. I've never seen another player explode like this after him. ”He played his first French professional game on August 17, 1988 against AJ Auxerre .

Weah quickly became one of the best strikers in the French league. With the Monegasque he won the French soccer cup in 1991 , a year later he was in the final of the European Cup Winners' Cup , which was lost to Werder Bremen . In the summer of 1992 he moved to Paris Saint-Germain and won other titles: the championship in 1994, the cup in 1993 and 1995 and the league cup in 1995 . Thanks in particular to his achievements in the Champions League , Weah was the first African ever to be voted Europe's Footballer of the Year and FIFA World Player of the Year .

AC Milan (1995 to 2000)

In 1995 Weah was signed by the Italian club AC Milan, where his teammates a. a. Franco Baresi , Paolo Maldini and Roberto Baggio included. In the first season ( 1995/96 ) the club won the championship ( Scudetto ), but could no longer build on previous successes on an international level. Weah later formed the storm duo of the 1998/99 championship season together with Oliver Bierhoff . When his performance subsequently waned, he was loaned to Chelsea FC in London during the winter break of the 1999/00 season .

Late years (2000 to 2003)

He won the FA Cup with Chelsea . Since coach Gianluca Vialli wanted to rejuvenate the squad, Weah moved to promoted Manchester City in the summer of 2000 . There he signed a two-year contract, which was dissolved in October 2000 by mutual agreement, as Weah was used only irregularly by coach Joe Royle and he was dissatisfied. He then played for a short time at Olympique Marseille and ended his career in the United Arab Emirates in 2003 .

National team

As part of the "golden generation" of Liberia, Weah took part in the 1996 and 2002 African Cup with the national team. Weah did not qualify for a world championship with the national team. In September 2018, the then 51-year-old led the team in a friendly against Nigeria. He was only substituted in the 79th minute. The number 14, with which he also played the game, should no longer be awarded in the future.

titles and achievements

Mighty Barolle (1985-1986)

• Liberian Championship (1): 1986
• Liberian Cup (1): 1986

Invincible Eleven (1986-1987)

• Liberian Championship (1): 1987

Tonnerre Kalara Club de Yaoundé (1987–1988)

• Cameroonian Championship (1): 1988

AS Monaco (1988-1992)

• French Cup (1): 1991

Paris Saint-Germain (1992–1995)

• French Championship (1): 1994
• French League Cup (1): 1995
• French Cup (2): 1993, 1995

AC Milan (1995-2000)

• Italian Championship (2): 1996, 1999

Chelsea FC (Loan 2000)

• English Cup (1): 2000

Personal honors

• FIFA World Player of the Year (1): 1995
• Europe's Footballer of the Year (1): 1995
• Africa's Footballer of the Year (3): 1989, 1994, 1995
• BBC African Footballer of the Year (1): 1995
• Onze d'or (1): 1995
• Africa's Footballer of the Century (1998)
• FIFA 100 (2004)
• UEFA Champions League top scorer (1): 1995
• FIFA Fair Play Award (1): 1996

Personal

His two sons George Jr. (* 1987) and Timothy (* 2000) also play soccer. During his time at PSG, he acquired French citizenship; he speaks the French language fluently. In early 2008, Weah briefly coached Japanese sixth division team Valiente Koriyama Tokyo .

Humanitarian engagement

He has been involved in humanitarian projects in Liberia since the mid-1990s. In 1994 he founded the football club Junior Professionals , of which he is president. Some of the players active there have made the leap to the Liberian national team. The prerequisite for membership is that the young people attend school regularly. Weah was a UNICEF ambassador and received the Arthur Ashe Courage Award in 2004 for his humanitarian work.

Political career

Lost presidential election 2005 and won senatorial post in 2014

In November 2004, he announced his candidacy for the presidential election on October 11, 2005, in which a successor to the interim president Gyude Bryant was determined. Despite his inexperience in politics, he was given a good chance of winning the elections as he is very well known and popular in the country. As President, Weah wanted to ensure that the United Nations peacekeeping force UNMIL remained stationed in Liberia for at least his first term of six years in order to prevent the civil war from flaring up again.

In the first ballot he reached 28.3% of the vote as a candidate for the Congress for Democratic Change, according to the preliminary official final result. Its fiercest competitor, former World Bank employee and former Treasury Secretary Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf , scored 19.8%. The runoff election took place on November 8, 2005. According to the official final result, he was well behind Johnson-Sirleaf with 40.6% of the vote, who achieved 59.4%. Weah complained of irregularities in the vote count. Johnson-Sirleaf, who was declared the election winner, hinted at offering Weah a ministerial position. Weah's party was reluctant to accept the result. In mid-December, Weah declared himself president in public speeches, which sparked unrest in Monrovia. A few days later, a meeting between Weah and Johnson-Sirleaf took place with the mediation of the former Nigerian President Abdulsalami Abubakar , which eased the situation. On January 16, 2006, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was sworn in as President.

After losing the election, Weah graduated from high school at the age of 40 and studied business administration in order to better prepare for his political career. On December 20, 2014, George Weah was elected to the Liberian Senate for the Montserrado region by a large margin ; his opponent was a son of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf.

Won presidential election 2017

In 2017, Weah took part again as a candidate in the presidential election after Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was constitutionally not allowed to run for a third term. The selection of his vice-presidential candidate Jewel Howard-Taylor sparked discussion . The Senator is the ex-wife of former President Charles Taylor , who was sentenced to 50 years in prison in 2012 for crimes against humanity. Weah denied any contact with the former head of state.

In the first round of voting on October 10, Weah was ahead of the previous Vice President Joseph Boakai with around 38 percent of the vote . Boakai appealed against the ballot because of “massive irregularities”. The lawsuits were dismissed, but the legal battles postponed the runoff between Weah and Boakai from the originally planned November 7th to December 26th. According to the election commission, Weah won the runoff election. After counting 98.5 percent of the ballot papers, he got 61.5 percent of the vote. The presidential election is considered the first democratic change in leadership in Liberia since 1944. Weah was elected for six years and took office on January 22, 2018. He heads the Weah government .

Web links

Commons : George Weah  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Biography on unicef.org (English)
• George Weah in the database of weltfussball.de
• Player profile in the AC Milan Hall of Fame

Individual evidence

1. ^ Joel Toe Joined Under-23. In: thenewdawnliberia.com (English)
2. ↑ iol.co.za: LOOK: Liberia's President George Weah, 51, takes on Nigeria in friendly (Sep. 12, 2018) , accessed on September 15, 2018
3. ↑ Chelsea hand trial to George Weah's son. In: inside World Soccer. March 30, 2013, accessed January 6, 2018 . 
4. ↑ George Weah, l'enfant du ghetto devenu président du Liberia. In: Le Monde Afrique. December 30, 2017, accessed January 6, 2018 . 
5. ↑ George Weah: First soccer star, now president. In: badische-zeitung.de , December 29, 2017, accessed on January 6, 2018
6. ↑ See the message Weah élu sénateur. In: France Football , December 28, 2014 (French)
7. ↑ World footballer from 1995: Ex-soccer star George Weah becomes the new president of Liberia. In: focus.de , December 28, 2017, accessed on December 28, 2017.
8. ↑ Ex-soccer star: George Weah wins presidential election in Liberia. In: Spiegel Online , December 28, 2017, accessed December 28, 2017.
9. ↑ Liberia's President wants to fight poverty. ( Memento from December 31, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) In: Luzerner Zeitung , December 31, 2017.
10. ↑ George Weah sworn in as Liberia's President. Der Standard , January 22, 2018, accessed the same day.