Sierra Leone Telegraph: 02 June 2026:
The Dutch government is planning to move a motion at the European parliament caling on the European Union to stop sending development aid to Sierra Leone, because of President Bio’s complicity in the growing global narcotics trade and protection of cocaine baron – Bolle Jos, according to Netherlands Times newspaper.
The Dutch Cabinet wants other European countries to help increase pressure on Sierra Leone in this way, Minister David van Weel of Justice and Security said on the television program Binnenhof, NOS reports.
The EU has allocated €325 million in subsidies to Sierra Leone for the period 2021 to 2027. The country also benefits from regional and international EU programs.
“It is, of course, bizarre that we facilitate or support a country that simultaneously offers a safe haven to one of the biggest drug criminals known worldwide,” Van Weel said.
Leijdekkers who is also known as Bolle Jos, is facing around 80 years in prison in the Netherlands and Belgium combined for drug trafficking.
In early May, Van Weel tried to exert pressure on the extradition process following diplomatic routes by speaking with his counterpart from Sierra Leone. He received the same answer that the Dutch government has been hearing for six months – that Sierra Leone is working on it, and the procedures are underway, he said on Binnenhof.
The Minister said he was under “no illusion” that anything would happen through politics. “So we are looking more broadly.”
This could mean taking wider covert military action in Sierra Leone, as was seen in Venezuela where the US government sent forces to carry out its security objectives, leading to the arrest of President Maduro and his wife.
Last month, the Telegraaf reported that the Netherlands had prepared an operation involving special police and navy forces to arrest Leijdekkers at sea in West Africa, but the operation was called off at the last minute. Van Weel declined to comment on this in Buitenhof.
According to the Dutch Justice Minister, arresting Bolle Jos (Photo: Seen here in a church in the President’s home town, with the President’s family) is one of his top priorities and also in Sierra Leone’s interest.
“In our estimation, this man has an income of hundreds of millions of euros per month in a country with a gross national product lower than his income. That will naturally corrupt such a country completely,” the Dutch minister said.
Van Weel talked about the record drug seizure in the Canary Islands in early May, where Spanish authorities intercepted a boat containing between 30,000 and 45,000 kilograms of drugs. Multiple Dutch people were arrested.
The Justice Minister spoke of an unprecedentedly large shipment, which everyone knows was loaded in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone.
“If you look at the amount of drugs that came off that ship, it cannot be true that cooperation with this operation was not provided across all levels,” he told Dutch national TV.
Bolle Jos is reportedly in a romantic relationship with President Julius Maada Bio’s daughter, which may complicate the extradition.
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