By Alphonso Toweh
Monrovia - Liberia's government said on Monday it was investigating reports of a coup plot after the loser of a run-off election last month renewed claims that he was the rightful president-elect.
Supporters of soccer star George Weah, who lost the November 8 vote to former Finance Minister Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, rampaged through a Monrovia suburb late on Sunday after the former AC Milan striker told them to fight for "liberation".
Johnson-Sirleaf was abroad and not due back until Friday.
Liberia's government held a crisis meeting on Monday to discuss the unrest, in which riot police with batons and plastic shields surrounded Weah's party headquarters as protesters smashed car windscreens and pelted officers with rocks.
"The government of Liberia has gathered from intelligence and security sources that there were some people plotting a coup. The security service is conducting an investigation into this report," Information Minister William Allen told said.
"There are two government officials who are said to be part of this plot. I cannot give you the details or their names because the investigation is still continuing," he said.
Weah, who has a strong following among young Liberians, and his Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) party say the November 8 polls were marred by widespread cheating. He won the first round vote but by too small a margin to claim outright victory.
In remarks to a late Sunday night rally that were broadcast repeatedly on Monday, Weah called on his supporters to rebel.
"My fellow revolutionaries, liberation is a noble cause. We must fight to obtain it," Weah said.
But in new remarks broadcast on his own King Radio station in Monrovia, he denied advocating violence and said security officials had visited him to investigate the coup allegations.
"This is a peaceful revolution ... It was not the CDC that provoked the police - it was the police that used tear gas and injured our supporters," Weah said.
"I am not a violent man. I am not a rebel," he added. "Why should I stage a coup? I call on my supporters to remain calm."
Armed police and United Nations peacekeepers were deployed around Weah's party headquarters on Monday, though in smaller numbers than on Sunday. Streets in the rest of the dilapidated oceanside city were quiet.
Justice Minister Kabene Ja'neh, whose vehicle was smashed and driver wounded in Sunday's violence, said the government would not tolerate any attempt to destabilise the country.
"Under our law, there can be no two presidents at a time. We want to make it very clear that no one individual or party will be allowed to derail this peace process," he said.
The elections were the first in the West African country since the end of 14 years of on-off civil war, which killed a quarter of a million people, displaced around a third of its population and destroyed its infrastructure.
A transitional government has led Liberia since the conflict ended in 2003 when warlord and then-President Charles Taylor went into exile in Nigeria.
Johnson-Sirleaf, whose victory made her the first woman to be elected leader of an African country, is on a visit to the United States where she is expected to meet senior US and International Monetary Fund officials in Washington before returning to Monrovia on Friday.