By Chernoh Alpha M. Bah
For several days, we have been sharing documents and details about the proposed plan by the Bio regime to privatize Sherbro Island and transfer it to the British energy group, Octopus Energy. We have emphasized that Idris Elba and Siaka Stevens are merely conduits for this agenda, which aims to corporatize Sherbro Island and transform it into a separate legal entity governed by a corporate board. So far, Sierra Leoneans have not been fully informed about the complete and real details of the scheme or its implications for the country’s politics and sovereignty.
However, underlying this project is a transnational initiative designed to seize part of Sierra Leonean territory and convert it into an experimental zone for a global energy network headquartered in the United Kingdom, with extractive and exploitative investments spanning across Western Europe, Asia, and North America.
In response to our ongoing discussion and efforts to raise public awareness about this corporate territorial seizure, Siaka Stevens, who is one of the public faces of the scheme, has attempted to defend the companies he and Idris Elba established for the Sherbro Island project.
Stevens’ response addresses two main issues we raised in our previous posts: the lack of sovereign capital for the project and the fact that the company they established is burdened with financial liabilities exceeding £5 million and has been dormant on the UK’s corporate register.
In his Facebook message, Stevens stated that “the claim that Sherbro Alliance Partners has largely existed as a dormant company is factually incorrect” and that the company is “active…with regularly filed accounts and ongoing operations.”
From the above, it is clear that Stevens appears to struggle in defending something that is inexplicable.
However, the most important takeaway from Stevens’ response is that he did not deny the company’s debts. Instead, he clarified that these debts are owed to one of the shareholders, specifically IE7, a company owned by Idris Elba. This confirms our earlier statement that Sherbro Alliance Partners lacks independent capital, and the financial resources it has purportedly used so far were obtained through a loan from one of Idris Elba’s companies. The loan, which was £2.2 million in 2021, has ballooned to nearly £6 million in FY2025. We refer to these types of investments as “corporate incest.”
Furthermore, while we reported that Sherbro Alliance Limited, the first company established by Elba and Stevens, was dissolved in 2019, we equally noted that the second company, Sherbro Alliance Partners, which they are currently using for the Sherbro Island project, is not only insolvent but also listed as a dormant company on the UK register. A dormant company is different from a non-existing company and is not the same as a fully functional and solvent company.
To clarify and enhance public understanding, here is a simplified explanation of the transaction records for the two companies established by Siaka Stevens and Idris Elba for their Sherbro Island project.
In 2019, Idris Elba and Siaka Stevens incorporated two companies in the United Kingdom for this project: Sherbro Alliance Limited (#12040217) and Sherbro Alliance Partners Limited (#12231721).
The first company, Sherbro Alliance Limited, was registered on June 10, 2019, as a private limited company (#12040217) under the UK Companies Act 2006, with Idris Elba and Siaka Stevens listed as directors and shareholders. On November 13, 2019, the directors applied for the company to be voluntarily struck off the UK Register of Companies. This application was published on November 26, 2019, and the company was ultimately dissolved on February 11, 2020.
The second company, Sherbro Alliance Partners Limited, was incorporated on September 27, 2019 (#12231721), also as a private limited company in England and Wales. Siaka Stevens is the only listed director of this company. At the time of registration, the shareholders were IE7 Holdings Limited and Siaka Stevens, each holding 50% of the shares. IE7 Holdings Limited was incorporated on April 3, 2019, with Idris Elba serving as its director.
The unaudited financial statements of Sherbro Alliance Partners Limited for the year ending December 31, 2024, indicate total liabilities of £5,287,147. This loan incurs an interest rate of 4% above the Bank of England’s base rate for repayments made outside of the specified repayment dates. In the fiscal year 2021, the loan amounted to £2,227,255, increasing by £634,138 to £2,861,393 by the end of fiscal year 2022. By the end of fiscal year 2023, this loan had reached approximately £3,491,172. Currently, the loan is estimated at around £6 million, which is more than double the principal amount from 2021.
Thus, UK corporate records indicate that Sherbro Alliance Partners has liabilities exceeding £5 million. Additionally, the company, founded by Idris Elba and Siaka Stevens for the Sherbro Island project, has largely remained dormant on the UK register.
An excerpt from the corporate profile of Sherbro Alliance Partners (#12231721) indicates that on October 23, 2025, the company’s director, Siaka Stevens, submitted an unaudited financial statement for the fiscal year 2024. This statement was classified as “accounts for a dormant company” with the UK Registrar of Companies (see the attached document for details on the company’s corporate filings and reporting records).
This situation raises an important question: how can a company with limited financial resources be expected to transform Sherbro Island into an independent economic entity?
The answer forces us to look at a broader transnational energy network that has identified Sierra Leone as a pilot site for the UN’s global energy initiative, launched at the Rio+20 Summit in 2012.
Stay tuned for more updates as we continue to investigate the proposed privatization of Sherbro Island and its potential implications for democracy in Sierra Leone.
Attached to this post is a document that details the corporate itemized filings and reporting records of Sherbro Alliance Partners with the UK Register of Companies from 27 September 2017 to 23 October 2025.