By Foday Moriba Conteh
One of Sierra Leone’s leading Mobile Operators in the country, Orange Sierra Leone on Thursday 28th October held a one-day engagement with media practitioners. The one-day engagement was geared towards updating the media about key highlights of their journey and their successes from April 2021 to date. The meeting was held at their Head Office on Hill Station in Freetown.
In her address, Head of Corporate Affairs & Publicity at Orange-SL, Annie Wonnie Katta, said that Orange is a passionate Corporate Social investor and they believe in the investing in the Socio-Economic development of the country, adding how they want to support Government’s initiatives to ensure the country move to another level of which she added that the company has been engaging on activities that has contributed tremendously towards the development of the country.
She noted that over the years they have supported Muslims who are finding it difficult to take care of their family with food items during the month of Ramadan by providing them with food items worth million of Leones across the country.
Annie Wonnie Katta maintained that as a company they have made the commitment to reduce carbon to 0 by 2040 in the country. And that they have been very deliberate in pushing environment initiatives in the country, furthering that internally they already set up an Environment Health and Safety Committee that will solely be responsible for looking after the environment and safety issues.
She maintained that in a bid to provide a platform for young innovators and creative thinkers in the country, in September 2021 the company awarded 150 million Leones to the two winners of this year’s Orange-SL Social Venture Prize Innovators competition.
The Communication Officer of Orange Foundation Sierra Leone, Alimamy Pallo Bangura, revealed that the Foundation was established to extend humanitarian gesture to the populace, which he said they have been doing since its inception.
He disclosed that the Foundation in April 2021, donated assorted food items worth 89 million Leones to the Sierra Leone Autistic Society for onward support to children living with Autism in their school and that the donated items includes 70 (50kg) bags of rice, 70 cartoons of tin tomato, 67 gallon of cooking oil, 70 bags of onions, 70 bags of sugar, and 70 bags of medicated soap.
The Communication Officer noted that in March 2021 the Foundation also launched the Maternal Health Project in Sierra Leone worth 600 million Leones which is geared towards safeguarding the health of pregnant women, lactating mothers and under-five children primarily as a pilot phase targeting the Kroo Bay community, adding that the Foundation also supported NaCOVERC with ICT equipment Data, furniture etc worth 450 million Leones for the distribution and administering of the COVID-19 vaccines. These and many more were highlighted by the Communications Officer of the Orange Foundation Sierra Leone as some of their interventions since April 2021 to date.
Assistant Manager, Marketing/Partnership Department at Orange Money, Sadia Kanu said that currently Orange Money has at least 1.3 million active based customers and they have made great success in terms of service delivery.
She stated that Orange Money has partnered with banks in the country in making possible accessibility to the Wallet to Bank and Bank to Wallet platform of sending and receiving money with a view to ease the workload on the Bank to give easy access to the banking system country wide.
Sadia Kanu said that Orange Money also launched the “Orange Money Lajor” in order to meet the financial needs of people who are in need of money by offering loans to them without guarantors or collateral securities as traditional commercial banks do request before granting loans which she said has been very supportive to customers.
She pointed out that Orange Money Sierra Leone continues to break new ground in Digital Financial Inclusion, of which they launched “Oversea Money”, in partnership with Western Union and BnB. Diasporas can now send money directly to the mobile phone wallet of their friends and relatives in Sierra Leone via Western Union, BnB and other Money Transfer Operators”.
A question and answer session climaxed the occasion.
