Liberia soccer hero appeals to masses with poll bid

Liberian soccer star George Weah started his campaign to become the next president of a country ruined by 14 years of war with some fairly basic promises: get the water running and turn on the lights.

Weah's presidential bid may have shocked Liberia's political elite but his plain speaking is making him wildly popular in a country trying to get back on its feet after one of the most brutal conflicts in Africa's modern history.

"You can trust me because I know you and you know me," Weah, the only African to have won the World Footballer of the Year award, told a crowd of thousands late on Tuesday as he launched his campaign for the October polls.

"We must rebuild our infrastructure. We must put our children back in school. Our farmers need ways to transport their goods and our people need relief from perpetual darkness," he said in the crumbling capital Monrovia.

The city, besieged by rebels who randomly lobbed mortars on houses, churches and bridges before a 2003 peace deal ended civil war, has been without mains electricity or running water for more than a decade.

Weah, 38, was born in a family of 12 children and grew up in a Monrovia shantytown. He went on to sign for Monaco, Paris SG and Milan.