“We’re Focused On Transforming Liberia’s Investment Climate” -Boakai Poise To Utilise SOEs Sector

By Bill W. Cooper
The government is expected to utilize the once dormant State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) sector so that it plays a pivotal role in revitalizing Liberia’s fragile economy.
During his recent State of the Nation Address (SONA), President Boakai presented a roadmap to the Legislators, his administration’s vision in transforming Liberia’s investment climate.
He maintained, “We are implementing policy changes to attract investments, including simplifying regulations, reducing red tape, and strengthening legal frameworks while ensuring social protection and local empowerment.”
According to the President, his administration has already engaged both domestic and international investors, showcasing Liberia as a land of untapped opportunities, though some key agreements are still pending.
Boakai added, “I am pleased to report that we are actively negotiating with major multinational companies in energy, mining, agriculture, infrastructure, and technology, and once finalized, these negotiations are expected to bring over US$3 billion in investments to our economy.”
However, this vision from President Boakai aims to leverage SOEs as catalysts for economic growth, promising a more robust and sustainable future for Liberia, amidst the ongoing reform of the country’s SOEs.
Governments often use SOEs to attract foreign investment in critical sectors deemed important for national development, like mining, oil and gas, or power generation, thus providing foreign investors with access to local markets and established networks within a country, which can be particularly valuable in economies with complex regulatory environments.
As government-owned entities, SOEs can leverage political connections to facilitate investment projects and navigate bureaucratic hurdles and may also directly invest in foreign companies through acquisitions, expanding their reach and diversifying their operations.
Since the inception of this administration, the current management team of the Bureau of State Enterprise (BSE) inherited an SOE Sector characterized by poor management, mismanagement, inefficiency, ineffective service delivery, lack of accountability and transparency, and weak oversight mechanisms.
These issues have resulted in the superb performances of SOEs, lack of public trust in SOEs, low support for SOEs in the national budget, and high fiscal burden to the national budget.
However, over the last nine months, the first approach of the current BSE management was to address the existing SOE governance challenges, developing a 4-year reform strategy and action plan for the sector.
The strategy prescribes to the roadmap aimed at strengthening the oversight mechanisms and achieving efficiency and effectiveness in the management and operations of SOEs. The 4-year reform strategy also outlined key reform goals that, when achieved, will strengthen the oversight and governance of SOEs.
Key among those initiatives were strengthening the Legal and Regulatory Framework for SOE Governance, developing governance and operational policies for SOEs, and improving the Monitoring and Accountability Mechanisms for the Sector.
However, amidst the ongoing governance reforms for the SOE sector, the BSE has remained engaged with SOEs as it relates to monitoring the operations. But the compliance of SOEs in terms of reporting to the BSE on their operations and performance continues to be a huge challenge, an issue that is attributable to the existing weak legal and regulatory frameworks.
Therefore, while it is in the process of crafting the required regulatory and governance policies, the BSE needs more political support to ensure accountability from SOEs and more responsible governance and management of SOEs.
Such political support, according to the BSE, will ensure that SOEs remain in check and do not operate in silos as it has been over the years.