Civil Society Resolve To Meet EITI Champion
By Mohamed Konneh
Civil Society Groups working on the Sierra Leone Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, have resolved to meet with the EITI Champion, Vice President Dr. Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh. The resolution came during the presentation of the 2025 EITI Work Plan at Boxton Memorial Hall, Charles Street in Freetown.
This latest resolution is as a result of challenges face in pushing the work of the EITI forward and limited finances to undertake activities. As it is financing remains a critical challenge for the implementation of the EITI process and much is not seen to be done with a number of activities hanging in the balance.
Making the resolution, Civil Society Activist, Cecilia Mattia, National Coordinator, National Advocacy Coalition on Extractives (NACE) present a strong case in meeting with the EITI Champion so as to brief him on the importance of the process and the need for government to pay key attention to it.
“There is every need to push implementation of EITI forward and we cannot afford the snail pace in funding the process that derails our progress. So much work has been put into this work but we are not seeing much from government,” Cecilia said.
Civil society organizations often face challenges in implementing the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) due to issues like limited access to information, lack of capacity to analyze complex data, government restrictions on their activities, potential reprisals for critical reporting, difficulty in mobilizing public awareness, and inadequate funding to effectively participate in the multi-stakeholder process.
This Ms. Cecilia Mattia noted can hinder progress and the ability to hold governments and companies accountable for transparency in the extractive industries.
Sierra Leone EITI Champion is the Vice President, Dr. Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh. The office of the Vice President according to information has little knowledge about the process.
This accordingly is not good for the implementation of the EITI. Funding is a big challenge in moving the EITI process forward and this was visible from the discussions during 2025 EITI work plan presentation.
The EITI Champion is responsible for overseeing the implementation of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Sierra Leone. The office of the EITI Champion receives information from the Chairperson of the Multi-Stakeholders Group (MSG) a situation that seem problematic of late.
In the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), civil society plays a crucial role in monitoring and advocating for transparency in the extractive sector by actively participating in the multi-stakeholder process, researching and analyzing data, holding governments and companies accountable, and raising public awareness about resource governance issues; essentially ensuring that citizens' interests are represented in decision-making regarding natural resource management.
“This process needed to be funded by government and not every time we should go clapping hands to donors for support. We are a sovereign state and it is time that we take responsibility of our destiny,” Cecilia Mattia challenged the meeting.
The meeting with Dr. Juldeh Jalloh is not just a meeting to ask for support but for government input and interest in the whole process.
“This is our demand as civil society and we want this meeting to happen now. We are almost at the end of the first quarter and yet the MSG has not met. The MSG is supposed to meet once every quarter. All of these will form part of the issues we will be taking to the champion Cecilia noted.
On Thursday 6th March 2025 the Sierra Leone Extractives Industries transparency Initiative and the Multi-stakeholders Group presented it 2025 work plan at the development stakeholder’s consultative workshop. The presentation was geared towards looking at the work plan for inputs into the process. The work plan is the guiding document for implementation.
