By Kemoh Saidu Sesay
At the just-concluded World Governments Summit 2026, President Julius Maada Bio wasted no time in sharing with the world about his government’s achievement on Sierra Leone’s free primary and secondary education.
But when asked an intriguing follow-up question by the panel’s host Tucker Carlson: “Mr. President, do you keep track precisely of how many of your young educated citizens leave and how many stay? Are you thinking hard about how to retain the smartest, most energetic people?” His response revealed a dangerous conflation: educating citizens but not keeping them.
Tucker hosted Day 2 of the summit’s session with African leaders, including Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Sierra Leone’s President Bio, and Botswana’s President Duma Boko, to share their perspectives on governance, growth, and global partnerships.
While President Bio is cheerfully promoting his FREE QUALITY education program in Sierra Leone to the world, the 2023 Gallup World Poll shows that an alarming 75% of Sierra Leonean adults want to migrate. This astounding number includes highly educated and skilled people, who are most likely to leave Sierra Leone for greener pastures. Their top destination targets are the United States and the UK, 45,031 and 28,656, respectively.
The Labour Market Profile Sierra Leone – 2023/2024 report states that skilled emigration constitutes 41% of total outward migration, depleting the country’s doctors, nurses, engineers, and teachers. Basically, almost all essential workers are fleeing. Shockingly, the International Migration Outlook 2025 states that approximately 87% of nurses trained in Sierra Leone now work abroad. This clearly shows the reason why the country’s health sector is unstaffed.
According to official Government reports like the 2024-2030 Medium-Term National Development Plan, it acknowledges that brain drain is a problem. In addition to that, the 2017 National Labour Migration Policy mentions diaspora skills transfer. However, the implementation of this document remains absent. Currently, the country has no dedicated diaspora engagement policy, and crucially, it offers no competitive salaries for young graduates, research infrastructure, or career pathways to retain local talent.
President Bio’s free primary and secondary education vision of producing “global useful citizens” risks becoming self-defeating. In a nation where over 75% of youth want to emigrate because of the grim reality of poverty, unemployment, and weak institutions, education alone fuels departure. It becomes an export pipeline for Sierra Leoneans rather than a national development tool. The Human Flight and Brain Index shows that the country remains very high at 6.5/10 in 2024, confirming ongoing skilled emigration.
It is worth mentioning that developing the human capital of a nation requires more than just tuition waivers for basic education. It requires retaining your brightest and most energetic people, which undoubtedly requires decent wages for professionals, funding for researchers, and private-sector growth that rewards local talent. Until the government redirects its vision and investments in keeping its educated and skilled citizens, not just producing them, the country will continue graduating its future elsewhere. Free education for all is necessary and commendable. But without opportunity, it accelerates the very crisis it seeks to solve.
