Challenges of public private partnership in supporting governance and development in Sierra Leone: Wellington-Masiaka Toll Road Project

Sierra Leone faces serious infrastructure deficits, which have dampened economic growth in recent years and seems undoubtedly to slow it down in years to come. Responding to these, the government has sought to find alternative ways to finance infrastructure with PPPs becoming an interesting mechanism to address these challenges. This study analyses the challenges of PPPs in supporting Sierra Leone’s governance and development so far. Results show that the PPPs' challenges in the country in this respect include China’s in-volvement in the country’s PPPs, access to finances, market forces, and legal-institutional architecture, corruption, and private sector insecurities. In addition, the research findings reveal legislative authority, and accountability and transparency as the major obstacles faced by PPPs when dealing with the Sierra Leone government and Chinese firm CRSG. Conse-quently, the study findings highlight that through upgrading policies to boost local private sector PPP actors and strengthen institution to combat corruption are key measures to counter the exploitive nature of Chinese state-owned construction companies. Further, employing and enhancing effective engagements to foster transparency in PPP’s overall process are vital measures to increase and uphold public trust and interests in delivering public services. Finally, mobilizing private sector finances and private sector involvement in championing for overall PPP project processes are crucial PPP interventions to comple-ment the government’s better solutions to public service delivery. The research concludes that putting all these facts into con-sideration, PPPs will have great potentials as a tool for long-term development of Sierra Leone’s infrastructure.