ACC To Investigate Former Deputy Finance Minister …For Deceiving The Principal On USL US$4.5 M Deal
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has opened investigation to look into the squandered US$4.5 million payment made by the University of Sierra Leone (USL) to a Nigerian company, Femab Properties for the construction of a New campus for its Business School, the Institute of Business Administration and Management (IPAM).
The ACC opened investigation on the matter after a publication by Africa Confidential which followed by publications by some local press highlighting the massive losses which could not be far from mismanagement and corruption.
Former ministers and former officials of the University of Sierra Leone (USL) who served President Bio have been named to have been involved in the bad deal.
One of the key players in the deal is the former Deputy Minister of Finance, Patricia Laverley who is now the African Development Bank’s Country Officer for Tazania.
According to the report, Patricia Laverley is believed to have deceived the Principal in the deal as she took the agreement in Parliament and reposed the confidence that the agreement will be fruitful.
That after a memo was filed by the then Financial Secretary, Sahr Jusu, the project got into difficulties over the sovereign guarantee for Femab’s share of the investment.
That the Bank of Sierra Leone (BSL), the central bank, pointed out in a memo that a guarantee like the one in the contract would breach the terms of Sierra Leone’s Extended Credit Facility (ECF) with the IMF.
That the country wasn’t allowed to ring-fence $37.5m in scarce foreign exchange for any scheme, however worthwhile.
“Despite this, the project’s champions forged ahead and in July 2019, Deputy Finance Minister Patricia Laverley secured Femab’s agreement to take the money in local currency instead of US dollars, according to their correspondence. It looks as though she imagined that if a US dollar guarantee was impossible, denominating the sovereign guarantee in Leones would be fine,” Africa Confidential stated.
The report maintained that in a celebratory introduction of the agreement on 16th July before the unanimous vote in favour, she (Patricia Laverley) told Parliament that: “We have identified all the possible risks of this investment and we have come up with appropriate mitigation measures to ensure that there is no default in the repayment of this Agreement,” she said.
That Patricia Laverley failed to respond to emails as to why she pushed the Bureh Town project so hard knowing fully well that no state guarantee was given.
