The office of the President of the Republic of Sierra Leone, Julius Maada Bio at State House has reportedly taken up the matter relating to the alleged donor procurement fraud that has been consistently reported by Standard Times, which amount of money was scooped from a US12Million Grant allocated to the government of Sierra Leone and manage by the Public Financial Management Unit (PFMU).

The sum of US $2.7Million was deducted from the grant to fund a Bank Switch Contract in the sum of US $2.7Million.

A tender was reportedly put out for interested bidders. The unit of the sponsored World Bank that is responsible for the management of donor funds in Sierra Leone is the Public Financial Management Unit, headed by Alpha Sissay.

This unit is considered the “corruption den” at the Ministry of Finance, where businesses are registered for the sole purpose of obtaining contracts from the unit with no operating office in the city of Freetown or the country, yet some of these businesses such as interlinks and Tee-Guy continue to bag contracts from this unit.

The reason some Sierra Leoneans may not know is that the head of the World Bank Team Lead, Alpha Sissay has relationships with owners of these businesses.

The company called Tee-Guy Investment is operating an account at the Zenith Bank where instructions are always giving for payments of contract amount to be made each time contracts are awarded to these companies. Other Commercial Banks with accounts that some of these businesses are operating accounts will be published in succeeding editions.

Now that the office of the President is carrying out an investigation into the procurement fraud that had been stopped by the NPPA, but ignored by the head of the team, the President’s team of investigators should access the Audit Report of the contract, should also look at how the process was manipulated and how the head of the team Alpha Sissay is reportedly chasing contractors for kickbacks. In addition to what was investigated, it is also reported that payment to some contractors have been deliberately delayed; especially those who refuse to give kickbacks when initial payments are being made.

It is also reported that the Minitrial Leadership of the Ministry of Finance, Mr. David Vandi has acted tough on this alarming procurement fraud and he is demanding an investigation into the fraud that has been exposed by the media.