By Abdul Fonti
The Deputy Minister of Justice, Umaru Napoleon Koroma stands out as one of the presidential appointees that is not only competent enough to serve in his official capacity, but also very much engaged in productive development and philanthropic activities across the country.
One typical example of his development activities is situate in the Nieni Chiefdom in the Koidnadugu District where he is engaged in massive agricultural activities targeting a total of over one thousand hectares of land.
In a joint family investment, the Nieni Agricultural Limited is already cultivating rice over a farm land space stretching almost 400 hectares in their second production year.
What started last year as a moderate farming activity is speedily turning into a large scale agricultural variety activity in that part of the country where the deputy minister hail from.
In a brief interview at the farm site last weekend, Napoleon Koroma, who doubles as Secretary General of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP), said his desire for farming was awaken by a recent clarion call made by President Julius Maada Bio for his appointees to support the government’s food self sufficiency agenda by embarking on farming activities.
“My cousins and I decided to come together to embark on the Nieni Agricultural Project by utilising the boliland our District is blessed with,” he pointed out.
While machinery remains a major challenge to the success of the project, Napoleon explained that he had to hire two tractors to help cultivate the 378 hectares of land out of a total of over 1000 hectares for this year’s production.
“To surmount the challenges we had last year with harvesting, we have secured a combined harvester to support the work this year,” he pointed out, while explaining that they have hired a farm manager that is effectively working on the project.
The deputy minister disclosed that the farm project will continue to expand every year.
He called on his colleagues in government to emulate such example to make Sierra Leone food self sufficient.
He further opted to assist his fellow government employees to secure bolilands in Koinadugu if their communities are not fertile enough for agricultural undertakings.
Chairman of the project, Poreh Koroma said the capital intensive investment will support job creation for young men and women in the community.
According to him, the district and country have not benefited alot from the low scale farming which their people had been embarking on over the years, thus the need to scale up the activities.
Project Secretary, Zack K.F Mansaray disclosed that the project will not be limited to rice production but will be extended to planting of banana, maize, ginger and livestock.
“We believe our activities here will go a long way to complement the president’s agenda for agriculture,” he noted.
According to him, they were working towards procuring tractors and more combined harvesters to be working on the farm and supporting other farmers in the coming years.
The project’s Public Relations Executive, Jim Kelly Jalloh, re-echoed that the project will not only support the actualisation of the president’s agriculture dream but will equally provide jobs for young people.
