NEWS Government Institutions Cripple Sierra Leone Housing Corporation...Owe Over Le1.2 Billion Posted by Ishmael Kindama Dumbuya on Jul 12, 2010, 16:01

Investigations carried out by this reporter have indicated that government functionaries including the Ministry of Defense, State House, Office of the Vice President, the House of Parliament etc owed the Sierra Leone Housing Corporation Millions of Leones as rent from 2000 to date, thereby crippling the Corporation and making it unfit to perform its functions efficiently as a statutory entity. The Sierra Leone Housing Corporation commonly called SALHOC has villas in Kissy, Hill Station and 7^th Battalion in Goderich.

A close source at the Corporation states that the government of Sierra Leone owed them Billions of Leones, the Military owed them over Two Hundred Millions Leones and also individuals occupying the Corporation villas at the Kissy Low cost Housing site are not willing to pay their monthly mortgages. 

The data collected showed that the government of Sierra Leone including staff of the Ministry of Defense, State House, Office of the Vice President and the House of Parliament of Sierra Leone owed a huge amount of Le1, 136,862,059.35 (One Billion, One Hundred and Thirty Six Million, Eighty Hundred and Sixty Two Thousand and Fifty Nine Leones) to the Sierra Leone Housing Corporation. The source adds that “A Member of Parliament belonging to the All Peoples Congress has stayed in one of the OAU Villas since 2005 to date owes the corporation Le71,000,000 (Seventy One Million Leones)” He is not making any progress to pay this money to the Corporation.

Information from the Board and the Corporation indicate that there are many reasons why the Corporation is not progressing. Some of the reasons, official sources alleged that the 62- year- old (14^th June 1948) General Manager of the Corporation, Mr. Kemoh Tarawalie is not willing to collect rents from the Government of Sierra Leone through the Ministry of Finance, for fear that he would step on many toes of government officials, which would be detrimental to his job.

When this reporter contacted him at his office and asked him about rent collection and monies owed to the Corporation by tenants, the 62- year- old Kemoh Tarawalie was quick to defend the Government of Sierra Leone giving reasons, as to why they as a Corporation should not be asking Government to pay rents for their quarters and buildings. He said that “the issue of confidentiality is very paramount to their business” adding that they should not be pushing negative things about the country as no one is going to make this country for us.

The question as to how we can develop the country when some people in  government are refusing to pay rents for building they are occupying that are owned by the Corporation, which would enable the Co,operation to perform its function well. The General Manager of SALHOC said “We both leave in Sierra Leone and know the situation of government too well as it relies on donor funding” and added “We should not be undressing our government in public.”

When asked about his retirement age which is long over due, he said “it was the prerogative of the Government to appoint me and it would be its prerogative to retire me at anytime”. The issue of rents owed to the Sierra Leone Housing Corporation has made the Corporation unable to pay salary to its staff and also meet the financial obligation of the Freetown City Council. With no Government allocation and the refusal of tenants who are being pampered by the General Manager to pay their rents, it is unclear as to how SALHOC can be able to perform it national assignment and maintain its housing project in the country.