Sierra Leone’s Anti-Corruption fight has faced serious setback following its recent fall in the latest Transparency International Index.
According to the latest Transparency International report 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) the country faced a debilitating drop to 33 out of 100, down from 35 in 2023, from 108 to 114 out of 180 countries assessed.
This drop according to watchers of the lead in the anti-corruption fight cannot be unconnected to his selective choice of perceived perpetrators, who are mostly low-ranking officials in the Government of President Julius Maada Bio.
The CPI evaluates public sector corruption perceptions by analyzing data from 13 global institutions, with Sierra Leone’s assessment drawing from nine sources, including reports from the African Development Bank, the World Bank, and the Economist Intelligence Unit.
Transparency International Sierra Leone (TISL) highlighted that this decline reflects a broader global trend, where over two-thirds of countries scored below 50, signifying pervasive corruption. The organization cautioned that corruption continues to undermine governance, hinder development, and erode public trust.
“Corruption destroys lives, weakens human rights, and fuels global crises. It blocks critical policy action, enables impunity, and deepens inequalities,” TISL stated.
This downturn contrasts with Sierra Leone’s progress in 2023, when the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) celebrated the country’s fifth consecutive year of improvement. Last year, Sierra Leone advanced from 110th in 2022 to 108th in 2023, with its CPI score increasing from 34 to 35.
But what has resulted in this recent drop is said to be attributed to Ben Kaifala’s blatant disregard of acts of corruption in high offices involving top-notch Government-party officials.
In his early years as Head of the Anti-Corruption Commission, he took delight in pursuing mostly opposition former members of government, some of whom had not defenses to put against his allegations, but to succumb to threat of imprisonment or refund in order to save their names. He is said to have conducted himself and the Commission in such robust manner, thereby gaining compliance from his perceived perpetrators with relative ease, thus giving him and the Commission the top-score ranking that spanned five consecutive years.
But according to watchers of the Commission now, he appears to have exhausted that pile of opposition preys and his hands appear tied behind his back, to now pursue and prosecute his SLPP party members who, it has been indicated are mostly enmeshed in the worst kind of corruption this country has ever experienced throughout her history.
It is hoped that this recent drop in ranking will serve as a notice to the Anti-Corruption Commissioner, Francis Ben Kaifala to push for the needful by going after real perpetrators, rather than those small boys who may have found themselves caught with crumps and letting off the hook those looting the State Coffers with impunity, simply because they could be paying back either to the SLPP party or to some hidden forces, who are serving as their protectors.
Some analysts are even concerned with the opulent show of wealth of Ben Kaifala himself. In a video posted on his Facebook page sometime in November-December last year, he is shown with a friend on the balcony of his reported multi-dollar house holding a glass of wine and the friend is heard telling him that he was living a life of paradise as epitomized by the sea view of his home his very lifestyle. The lifestyle of the country’s anti-corruption boss has of late become a matter of concern to the extent that he has even arrogated to himself to challenge the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee in Parliament over who has prima-farcie authority over the Auditor-General’s report when it is published.
But watchers are of the view that his self-adopted arrogance and apparent disregard of the authority of the Parliament that ensured the being of the Commission he now heads, must be coming from the higher echelon of Government and the SLPP, which by all indications is telling that the center no longer holds in both the Government and the party.
The fight against corruption is a national fight which by law, must not be seen to selective or be seeing to be placing some citizens above the anti-corruption act and the rest of the laws of the country.
Francis Ben Kaifala must buck-up to the reality that justice delayed, is justice denied and that no one is above the law. But the nation has witnessed a number of twists and turns in these applications, notable among which is his surreptitious interpretation of the anti-corruption Act when he was charged to investigate whether the First Lady was receiving money direct from the Consolidated Revenue Fund to fund her activities; a matter that was of public concern. He manipulated the dictates of the anti-corruption Act such that, he had to draw instances from the former First Lady Madam Sia Nyama Koroma, stating that if he must investigate the current First Lady, Fatima Jabbie-Bio, he would be compelled to go back ten years in order to ascertain his case against Mrs. Bio. There are several other corruption matters on his lap that were in a way handled in such quaky manner.
It is no doubt therefore that the country’s ranking has slumped and indications are that it will continue to slump because Francis Ben Kaifala and his team do not wish to put the names and integrity of SLPP financiers even as they continue to pillage this country with impunity and the reckless abandon they have so sanctioned on Sierra Leone since their coming to power in 2023.