The Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources Emma Kowa-Jalloh has landed in police custody over the suicide death of a Korean Businessman in Sierra Leone.

Kowa has been interviewed by the Criminal Investigations Department at her Youyi Building Office in Freetown in relation to his death.

She was interviewed concerning her ministries’ involvement in the Korean businessman Kim Sung Nyeon suicide note.

The ministry was implicated in the note as being the cause of him committing suicide.

He had claimed in his suicide note that he was being unfairly treated by some senior officials in the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources including the Minister.

In his suicide note, the Korean businessman narrated his ordeal at the hands of some selfish people working in the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources.

Nyeon had several fishing vessels in Sierra Leone, with six of the vessels marked “Jian Mei 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, & 6”.

According to sources, he had on several occasions been warned to fully comply with the fishing regulations by not fishing within the country’s Inshore Exclusion Zone (IEZ). Fishing within the IEZ attracts a fine of between US$500,000 and US$1,500,000.

On March 28, 2020, two of Nyeon’s vessels (Jian Mei 1 and Jian Mei 5) were photographed fishing within Sierra Leone’s IEZ. One of them was fined US$1.5M.

The Environmental Justice Foundation on 30 March 2020 informed the Sierra Leonean authorities that Nyeon’s vessels (Jian Mei 3, 5, and 6) were operating illegally within Sierra Leone’s Inshore Exclusion Zone (IEZ).