Ugandan heads Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone World Bank office

Nov 04, 2015

A Ugandan national, Henry Kerali has taken over as the head of the World Bank Country office for Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

By David Mugabe

A Ugandan national, Henry Kerali has taken over as the head of the World Bank Country office for Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone.


The World Bank Ugandan office confirmed the appointment of Kerali who has been tasked with three main priorities including working closely with the three partner countries to provide innovative products and services that respond to their diverse development challenges.

They are also tasked with contributing to achieving sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction, with a specific emphasis on post-Ebola recovery.

Sheila Gashishiri from the Uganda World Bank country office described Kerali as composed.

Kerali will be expected to manage the Accra office and lead and support staff and the country management team, working closely with internal and external partners to enhance results, as well as contribute to regional and corporate initiatives.

Kerali who took over office on July 1, 2015, joined the Bank in 2003 in the infrastructure & energy department in the Europe and Central Asia (ECA) region.

His entry into West Africa comes at a time when the three countries are all faced with serious economic challenges that are crippling their economies.

For instance in Ghana, the country is faced with major fiscal challenges that have sent the country almost on its knees with the country turning for financial help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Presently Ghana is facing a depreciating currency, energy crisis, the worst in many decades, high cost of living, high interest rates and high inflation, among other things.

These challenges have forced many businesses to either lay off workers to enable them remain afloat.

In Liberia and Sierra Leone, the dreaded Ebola disease has ravaged the two countries and brought business activities and agriculture almost to a standstill.

The gains made in the past have all been eroded, leaving the war ravaged countries with very little to survive on.

“As a result, the citizens of all the three countries will be looking forward to positive and pragmatic initiatives from the new management to get the bank to be more supportive of their development agenda,” reads a Ghanaian news agency.

Before joining the Bank, he was a Professor at the University of Birmingham, England, specializing in the development of transport infrastructure.

He led the research of developed economic cost-benefit models for assessing the feasibility of infrastructure investments.

Kerali holds a BSc (Eng.) from Makerere University, and MSc and PhD from the University of Birmingham, UK.

Prior to taking up this new appointment, Kerali was the World Bank's regional director for the South Caucasus, based in Georgia.

He has previously also worked in different regions of the world, including Latin America, Africa, East Asia, South Asia, and ECA, and has also served as sector manager of the Bank's transport programme in the ECA Region.

As a professor, he has authored over 100 publications in various books, journals and reports.
 

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