Amb. Angie Von Ballmoos, Liberia Ambassador to Sierra Leone

Here is how she succeeded to apply President Boakai’s ARREST Agena to MRU Countries

Abubakar Hashim /Monrovia

Liberia Ambassador to Sierra Leone, Angie Kolue  Ñynemah Lavela Von Ballmoos is, today, a peoples’ Ambassador, not by coincidence, but a journey fraught within a difficult terrain.

During the peak of Liberia’s bloody civil war, she was a refugee in neighbouring Ghana between 1996 to 2013, a 24-year period she is proud as an ambassador to label herself once a refugee.

During these 24-year difficult periods, Ambassador Angie cultivated what is today is the primary goal of diplomacy: People-centered policy, anchored on economic diplomacy.

As a refugee in Ghana, she started learning the intricacies of diplomacy as the wife of the then Liberian Ambassador to Ghana, where she was a good mixer and a mobilizer of people in addressing their needs, through collaboration and networking.

Appointed Liberia’s Ambassador to Sierra Leone a little over one year ago, she has been operating an open-door policy. The embassy has gained maximum visibility and has become an economic hub, a prime gate-way for viable entities to commence commercial business in Siera Leone like Aminata Oil and Gas, Mara Poma, others, thereby promoting economic diplomacy, a core ingredient of President Boakai foreign policy.

When President Boakai recently visited Sierra Leone on invitation by President Bio, on November 18, 2024, an economic fair was launched by Ambassador Angie at the Liberian embassy at Spur Road in Freetown.

The fair was attended by over 2000 guests. President Boakai was visibly impressed and engrossed at the event.

Among issues addressed at a launch she recently organized for few selected guests at the embassy, Economic Trade Liberalization Scheme, ETLS, ECOWAS residence permits, Mano River Union MRU, among others, were top on the agenda. ‘’ETLS should be decentralized to the people to understand, through public communication. Effects of the wars, instability and lack of funds among others, contribute to lack of implementation of ECOWAS protocols’’ she further remarked.

The ‘’Kolue’’, as she is popularly called, meaning first girl in her family in Liberian local parlance, is from Lofa County. She was born in Monrovia but grew up in Grand Cape Mount.

‘’Kulue’’, also means bravely in decision making in traditional Liberian set up. Ambassador Von – Ballmoos has exhibited this bravery by extending President Boakai’s ARREST agenda beyond the shores of Sierra Leone, into the neighboring Maro River Union MRU countries, through collaboration and shared progress, amidst challenges posed by climate change.

She has pushed the ARREST agenda into a beacon of hope and a model for sustainable development, not only for Liberia and Sierra Leone, but for the entire MRU region.

She has opened up doors of viable investments in Sierra Leone, through her economic fair she recently hosted in Sierra Leone and in Liberia. Today, viable and credible companies are exploring opportunities for investments in the MRU region through her networkings.

In the immediate future, she intends to extend the ARREST agenda of President Boakai to the entire ECOWAS region through her robust networking and economic diplomacy.