For years, the conversation about diaspora investment in Sierra Leone has unfolded largely on the margins in WhatsApp groups, at community events overseas, in the speeches of politicians who return home with promises but leave without mechanisms. That conversation is now moving into a different register.
Vickie Remoe, Founder and Chair of the Sierra Leone Diaspora Investment Conference, has announced a formal strategic partnership with the Government of Sierra Leone to co-host the SLDIC 2026 a two-day conference scheduled for the 19th and 20th of June at the InterContinental Hotel, Park Lane, London. The partnership, confirmed through a press release from the National Investment Board Secretariat under the Office of the Vice President, marks the most significant state endorsement the conference has received since its founding.
“I am deeply grateful for this collaboration,” Remoe said in announcing the partnership, “which will enhance our effort to create clear, actionable pathways to channel the financial and intellectual capital of our global citizens directly into national development.” The language is deliberate. The emphasis on “actionable pathways” reflects a maturation in how diaspora engagement is being framed moving beyond the rhetoric of belonging and into the architecture of investment.
The Sierra Leone Diaspora Investment Conference is an annual initiative dedicated to mobilising the financial, intellectual, and social capital of the Sierra Leonean diaspora for national development, serving as a premier platform for facilitating diaspora engagement and direct investment. Remoe founded the conference in 2023, and what began as a community convening has since evolved into a multi-city, government-backed enterprise.
The 2026 conference will take place across three continents London, Silver Spring, and Freetown reflecting the organisers’ commitment to maximising participation from the worldwide Sierra Leonean diaspora and international investors. London, however, is where it all begins.
The choice of the British capital is not incidental. As one of the world’s leading financial hubs, London provides the ideal environment to tackle some of the biggest barriers diaspora investors face trust, structure, and access. These are not abstract concerns. Sierra Leoneans in the UK represent one of the largest and most economically active segments of the country’s diaspora, and the gap between their stated willingness to invest at home and their actual ability to do so has long been a source of frustration on both sides of the Atlantic.
The National Investment Board will serve as the government’s lead institutional partner for the conference. The NIB’s Executive Director, Dr. Sandy, has framed the event as part of a broader effort to reshape Sierra Leone’s investment landscape. The conference structure across its two days reflects this ambition the first day dedicated to government engagement and policy dialogue, with high-level plenary sessions involving key ministries; the second focused squarely on investment mobilisation and private sector engagement, including a dedicated pitch platform for investment-ready businesses.
This year’s conference is designed to do more than spark conversations it is about clear, structured pathways for the diaspora to invest, partner, and actively participate in Sierra Leone’s economic future. That intent has already attracted commercial weight. TAF Africa Global Limited has been named as the Global Visionary Headline Sponsor of SLDIC 2026, bringing with it the credibility of one of West Africa’s most active real estate developers, whose TAF Salone Micro City project outside Freetown represents exactly the kind of large-scale, diaspora-accessible investment vehicle the conference is designed to spotlight.
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The Vice President’s office and NIB Director Dr. Sandy both receive specific acknowledgement from Remoe in the partnership announcement a signal that the backing extends beyond bureaucratic formality into genuine institutional championship.
Registration for the London conference is now open at MakeSierraLeoneFamous.com. The question Remoe posed in announcing the news carries its own quiet urgency: London is where deals will be made. Where will you be?
