The Government of Sierra Leone, through the Minister of Communications, Technology, and Innovations, Madam Salima Bah, announced in Freetown that it plans to privatize Sierratel to enable it to effectively compete with the private sector, which is currently dominated by Africell, Orange, and Qcell.

In her remarks, Madam Bah said, “Now that Africell, Orange and Qcell are operating in the country. We believe that this is the time to privatize Sierratel to enable them compete with the private sector. The government is in the process of privatizing Sierratel,”

Her statement during the weekly government news conference, organized by the Ministry of Information and Civic Education on Tuesday, August 13th, 2024, raised hopes for Sierratel’s privatization. She outlined the avenues the government will explore for the potential privatization of Sierratel.

“But the most important is that there is an audit. To attract investors, you need to know what is on the table. It is good to know how many assets, infrastructure and liability the Company has because Sierraiel has liability and the potential value the Company will make. When we know all of this from an independent and well-respected source, we will work with the National Commission for Privatization (NCP) to go through the privatization process,”she told journalists.

She further assured that the government is working to ensure that Sierratel remains sustainable until privatization is achieved.

She said, “We will look at how to provide for the workers and their operational cost. Be rest assured that Sierratel is a priority. The government is also looking at how the privatization will look like and which kind of operation the Company should be like to be able to compete with the private sector.”

It could be recalled that for the past five years, Sierratel has been facing serious challenges in paying salaries to their workers and continuing with their daily operations due to a lack of resources.