Do Sierra Leone Commercial Banks Play a Developmental Role?
The traditional functions of Commercial Banking in Sierra Leone have undergone rapid transformation since independence. The total assets of commercial banks currently operating in the system increased a great deal since 2000 with branches now spring up allover the country with a total number of employees exceeding 1500. Commercial banks real credit to the private sector is also growing at a very high rate. As with real credit to the private sector, the total deposits, on an average, witnessed a higher growth rate since 1999. If the rate of growth of deposits is an indicator of the ability of commercial banks to mobilize deposits, the performance of commercial banks in Sierra Leone has been quite commendable in the recent past. However, it is worthy to note here that there has been a considerable shift in the structure of deposits particularly since 1996 with a noticeable slide in the growth rate of time deposits. This would tend to suggest, that despite the high growth in the overall d
