The Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf appeared on national television on Sunday evening, congratulating her compatriots on a non-violent campaign and urging them to hold an equally non-violent election. She deftly moved between a party political broadcast for her own candidacy and a call for everyone to behave and respect the results of the election.

By Bram Posthumus, Monrovia

Meanwhile, all over the capital, people were returning home from the final party rallies, once again soaking wet as the Monrovia sky sent down one of its wild trademark thunderstorms. Never mind: the chanting, shouting, banter and dancing went on until late. By midnight on Sunday, however, all campaigning had to stop. But then again, what would be the difference? The campaigns had already seamlessly segued into a massive dance party.

Giant dance floor
This was certainly the case on Friday, when the opposition Congress for Democratic Change comprised of Winston Tubman (lawyer, ex-minister and former UN official) and football legend and aspiring politician, George Weah, took over Monrovia and turned it into a giant dance floor.

This is what you do: you hoist enormous speakers onto dozens of different cars, tie them in place with rope, put on the CD with all the party tunes – and hit the road. Oh, and play the music loud, very loud! A sea of white and yellow CDC T-shirts followed, dancing, ducking and weaving across the streets and acting out the campaign slogans of both sides.

Eh will (na) hold!
Ah – the slogans! No-one does them better than Liberians doe. ‘Monkey still working let baboon wait small.’ This message from the ruling Unity Party of the charismatic Johnson-Sirleaf and the self-effacing but effective Joseph Boakai means to say: those who can only take and give nothing in return must wait a little longer, because the work that is needed to provide for these parasites is not yet done.

It is, of course, a slogan that can be recycled at every election. The CDC, meanwhile, is challenging the widespread belief among the UP faithful that it will take just one round to re-elect the team Johnson-Sirleaf/Boakai. “Eh will hold!” one side shouts. The reply: “Eh will na hold!” (“It will be decided in the first round!” “No it won’t!”)

No more Taylor
Festive and good-natured - it sums up the last few days. No more “He killed my pa, he killed my ma, I’ll vote for him,” former warlord and ex-president Charles Taylor’s bone-chilling message in 1997, promising that he would take the country back to war if he was not elected. He won, but his calamitous reign is now a distant memory.

Monrovia has never felt so tension-free, which is rather miraculous given Liberia’s recent upheavals. Veteran peace activist Etweda Cooper puts it well: “For eight years now, no kid in Liberia has heard a gun go off or seen his parents frightened and on the run.” She would like to see her candidate and Nobel Peace Prize winner Johnson-Sirleaf, continue to build on that foundation.

“Liberians are not stupid”
Consolidate the peace. That message came from the other Liberian Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Leymah Gbowee, as she was standing in the middle of that oh so familiar election scene: a circle of women dressed in white, sitting near the city’s airfield, a stone’s throw away from her own polling station.

Gbowee: "This prize is a symbol for every Liberian women and every African woman who has gone through conflict. And what you see here is another symbol of the women who advocated for peace in Liberia." And how does she account for the peaceful campaigns? "Well, I think Liberians are not stupid people. You know, people may think that because we thought for fourteen years this is the only language that we know. But no-one wants to see a bullet fired in this country."

Repeat performance
Talking with the dancers and singers in the slipstream of the CDC party cars on Friday and the UP’s party truck on Sunday, a pattern emerged. The CDC followers veer between resentment (“This government made me lose my job”) and a desire to have a bigger slice of Liberia’s pie than they currently have.

The UP supporters, for their part, relentlessly hammer home the achievements of the outgoing government: roads, clean streets, schools, law and order for all and peace: we want more of that.

They will fight it out on Tuesday, along with 14 other candidates. This makes an outright victory for the incumbent president unlikely, so the 2011 runoff will probably be a virtual repeat performance of the last election: Weah versus Johnson-Sirleaf. With the strengthening peace playing its role - in the background.