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Of about 73 properties to be confiscated by the state as sanctioned in the recommendations of the Commissions of Inquiry set up in 2018 by President Bio to look into aspects of mal-administration of the erstwhile APC led government from 2007 to 2017, only four properties for which conveyances have been prepared and hence, literally now belong to the custody of the Government of Sierra Leone.
And what is more interesting is that, of the four properties for which conveyances have been so far processed to meet confiscation requirements, two belong to dead people; with the other two to an absentee person of interest to the Commission. All those persons of interest of the COI living in Sierra Leone and whose properties were listed for confiscation have filed contention to the Appeal Court against the COI recommendations; with a number of them including former Lands Minister, Diana Konomanyi winning their appeal case and their properties accordingly yielded to them by the court.
When confronted with these uneven developments in the implementation of the COI recommendations with regards properties, Chairman, National Assets and Government Property Commission in the Office of the President, Chief Abu Hindolo Moseray accepted there was a bumpy road ahead in implementing that aspect of the COI recommendations that they are concerned with. He admitted that two properties belonging to the former Minister of Transport and Aviation in the APC government, Logus Koroma one in Kono in the Eastern Region and another at Gbangbayilla in the Western Region have been successfully transferred to the ownership of the State. The other two, a house at Robert Street in Freetown and another at Gloucester Village in Western Region belong to late Momoh Conteh, formerly of NATCOM and Dr. Minkailu Bah who served as the longest Minister of Education respectively. With the pending matters at the Appeal Court and why the Court have not done due diligence to the COI recommendations, Chief Moseray says he is worried that “justice delay is justice denied”.
He is blaming the delays on the court bureaucracies. “I blame the courts for the delay in conveying the confiscated properties to government”. He is particularly unimpressed that the matters have taken long on the desk on the Appeal Court Judges.
“And two questions arise over the delay in proceedings at the Appeals Court,” he rhetorically asks. “Are the judges working in the interest of the government or not? Are they independent that they want to country to move forward as already some are off the hooks like Diana Konomanyi”?
According to The New Storm Newspaper, the Chairman also informed that of the two unclaimed properties in Kono and Makeni are now being used by NaCOVER. He also decried the action of the police in Makeni as according to him, two properties in Makeni are not accessible because of the recalcitrance of the owners. “The police do not seem to cooperate to let the Asset Commission take possession of those properties, one of them belonging to Ignosious Koroma.
