SALWACO MD – Ing. Tiideni Hawa Jabbi

The first female Managing Director has achieved tremendous successes in her first six month in office. Ing. Tiideni Hawa Jabbi came into the role with resounding optimism and a focus to see that SALWACO becomes ‘fully functional and a financially viable institution.’

She got into work effective immediately. Appointed in October 2025 by President Maada Bio and eventually approved by the Parliament of Sierra Leone in November 2025, the six months in office of MD THJ have been nothing, but commendable.

In an exclusive engagement with the press, she thanked President Bio for the appointment. ‘’ Firstly, I want to say a very big thank you to His Excellency the President, Rtd. Brd. Julius Maada Bio for creating the enabling environment for women to attain leadership roles. That enabling environment through the law that was enacted has created the space for women to be in leadership roles. I am honoured to serve as the First Female Managing Director of the Sierra Leone Water Company (SALWACO).’’

On her achievements so far, MD Jabbi said that;

President Bio appointed me in October 2025. I was approved by Parliament on the 11th November, 2025. I assumed office on the 12th of November, 2025. Upon my assumption of office, I developed a 100-day assumption of office plan. That plan ensured an extensive organizational assessment of SALWACO. It was like a diagnostic analysis. The assessment had an aim of looking into the existing challenges. The assessment took a SWOT approach. It looked at the strengths, weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. In the end, we came up with two recommendations; quick win and short-term recommendations. One of the quick ones was to ensure an innovative billing and revenue management system. SALWACO is a water utility agency and so it should be able to generate revenue. Over the years, it could be argued that SALWACO has been lagging behind as it had not been fully functional to meet nationalistic demands.

The original mandate of SALWACO is to be a water utility and sanitation institution aimed at providing water for people at an affordable rate, outside Freetown. There was however some element of deviation from the company and so a rearrangement is prudent. This is why we are now focused on making the institution fully functional and a financially viable institution. Upon assuming office, I found out that SALWACO does not have an integrated smart revenue management system. We had some elements of manual revenue collection. That is one thing that challenges transparency. We wanted to have a shift for the better and so we had to go into work, proper. So, this is what informs the idea of having a smart commercial management system which allows us to make a judicious usage of all our revenue.

Another achievement is the enhancement of SALWACO’s organizational model. To execute tasks and functions accordingly, structures have to be put in place. That need cannot be overstated. A general enhancement of units and departments was instantly instituted with a thrust to enhance quality service delivery. This is aided to see that we get some increase in our revenue generation drive.

The development of our five-year strategic development plan is another vital achievement. One of the outcomes of the organizational assessment showed that SALWACO lacked a strategic direction. Interventions had been done on an ad-hoc basis. The plan covers the period 2025-2030 and we lunched it in March, 2026. This SDP was done in-house. This is another thing worth commending. Mostly, other institutions may hire experts to do same, but we challenged ourselves and we were able to produce the results. This saved us a whole lot of money, but it has also made sure that we all now follow the strategic and right direction.

Another achievement is that we are currently reviewing the SALWACO act of 2017. This is also an outcome of the organizational assessment. He legal framework to give SALWACO the power and ability to effectively operate was a bit challenging. So, a revisitation was needed. These are some of the crucial achievements we have recorded since I came in SALWACO MD.

Copyright –Published in Expo Times News on Monday, 18th May 2026 (ExpoTimes News – Expo Media Group (expomediasl.com)