By Henry Kargbo
The Chief Executive Officer of Sierra Leone Investment and Export Promotion Agency (SLIEPA) has asked the Ministry of Finance to increase the Agency’s budget to Le5.2Bn for 2023.
CEO Sheku Lexmond Koroma made this demand on Tuesday 27 September 2023, during the budget hearing at the Ministry of Finance in Freetown.
According to Mr Lexmond, SLIEPA was requesting such an amount of money mainly because the agency had witnessed on several occasions where investors would leave the country on simple matters or issues they might be able to handle or settle amicably.
He said the institution did not want to see where investors invest 20 or 30 million dollars and because of bad treatment they had to pack and go without settlement, adding: “But if we have the resources we can able to settle such matters.”
Lexmond says that SLIEPA always advises investors to work with them as they are the only institution that could handle investment affairs better compared to other institutions in the country.
He furthered that SLIEPA has the technical knowhow on how to guard investors and even offer them some training on how to export some goods they might process after a successful investment.
He told participants at the hearing that SLIEPA has more investors in Sierra Leone now than it had in the past five years.
He added that the positive intervention and interaction of SLIEPA with investors has been giving investors full confidence to invest and adapt to the country’s business environment without they experiencing harassment compared to what obtained five years ago
