FREETOWN, April 3 (NNN – AFRICANEWS) – Sierra Leone’s Finance Minister says over a billion dollars of state funds cannot be accounted for following a technical audit into government transactions over a three-year period.
Local media reports that minister Jacob Jusu Saffa used the term “stolen” for the unaccounted for funds siphoned between 2015 and 2018.
The audit looked into the affairs of eleven state run entities including the national telecoms outfit and the ministry of works and public assets.
Audit experts pooled from across the continent – Tanzania, Ghana, Kenya – were invited to join their Sierra Leonean counterparts in the special assignment whose mandate straddled the telecoms, roads, energy and security sectors.
President Julius Maada Bio has since coming into office last year promised to step up the fight against corruption. He has promised to retrieve stolen monies and to also strictly deal with any incidents that may arise in his administration.