The Governor of the Bank of Sierra Leone (BSL), Professor Kelfala Kallon, is reported to be meddling in the administration of Rokel Commercial Bank (RCB) just because he is said not to be seeing eye-to-eye with RCB’s Managing Director Dr Ekundayo Walton Gilpin.
Prof. Kallon is said to have revived his fight with Dr Gilpin after a Special Investigative Committee (SIC), set up by the Bank of Sierra Leone (BSL) to investigate an allegation of sexual harassment against Dr Gilpin, cleared him of any wrong doing.
But in a letter to the RCB Board, dated 12 September 2022, the Bank Governor stated that, “While thanking the SIC for devoting time and energy to investigating the instant matter, this letter serves as a formal notice that the SIC is hereby dissolved and that all decisions and recommendations regarding the extant complaint shall come from the full Board. In this regard, I wish to inform the Board that I feel compelled to reject the findings and conclusions communicated to me in your 25th July 2022 letter because they were reached by a subset of the Board (not the full Board, as I had directed in my 18th July 2022 letter). Consequently, the Board (excluding the MD and the LA/CS) is again directed to review the Report of the SIC, the legal opinion of the BSL’s LAD, and RCB’s Policies and Procedures, as well as all complaints that have been lodged to it by the LA/CS and her colleagues about workplace intimidation. The findings and recommendations from that review must be submitted to me no later than Close-of-Business on Friday, 30th September 2022.”
It is further alleged that despite RCB has a Board, which should be regulating the activities of the bank, the Bank Governor is said to be trying to dictate how the day-to-day affairs of RCB should be run. He is reported to be doing this by using some senior staff in the bank to carry out his biddings.
But what is baffling many Sierra Leoneans is the fact that as the country is facing high inflation and high foreign exchange rate; they are expecting Prof. Kallon to have been more concerned about fixing these economic problems rather than meddling in the day-to-day running of RCB.
One insider at the Bank of Sierra Leone is reported to have told a close friend that the Bank Governor might be targeting Dr Gilpin because he thinks the latter might be given his job.
