Afsatu Kabba who was serving as Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources until Monday March 15th was charged to court by the ACC of 17 Count for various corruption charges. The former Energy Minister is accused among other things of accepting $3000 as inducement from Lilian Ada Lisk of Okeky Fishing Agency for the issuance of licenses for fishing boat operated by Okeky Fishing Agency.

A press release from State House announcing the sacking of Kabba reads: “The General public is hereby informed that Haja Afsatu Kabba, Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources and Paul Sandi, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources were on MONDAY 15th March 2010 charged to court in Freetown by the Anti-Corruption Commission. While she is standing trial, Haja Afsatu Kabba has been relieved of her duties as Minister by His Excellency The President.”

The release continued: “In the Case of Paul Sandi, he is to be interdicted from the Civil Service with immediate effect. In consequences thereof, it has pleased His Excellency The President to announce the following changes in Government:

1. Joseph M. Koroma, presently Minister of Presidential & Public Affairs now becomes Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources

2. Haja Jenneh Kandeh, presently Deputy Minister of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs is re-assigned as Deputy Fisheries& Marine Resources

3. Rosaline Oya Sankoh, Deputy Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources is re-assigned as Deputy Minister of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs.

Kabba became the second minister to be dragged to court under the two and half year of President Ernest Bai Koroma’s administration for corruption offences. Koroma vowed during his inaugural speech in late 2007 that his administration will leave no stone un-turn in the fight against corruption and there will be “no sacred cow”. In his bid to fight the menace, parliament enacted a law which gives the ACC extensive powers making the body one of the toughest in the region.

Sierra Leone is still recovering from an 11-year bloody civil war which left more than 75 thousand dead whiles millions of properties were razed to ashes. Corruption was identified as a defining factor to the country’s development. The 2008 Transparency Corruption Index ranked Sierra Leone in 158 out of 180 in their Corruption Perception Index but Koroma argued that "I have no doubt, that like the phoenix, we shall rise from the ashes of war and rise like the proud nation that we are, the Athens of West Africa.”