The Chief Executive Officer of the Saudi Fund for Development (SFD) Sultan A. Al-Marshad, has assured President Adama Barrow that they will continue to support Gambia’s preparation for the 2022 OIC Summit to be hosted by the latter country.
In a dispatch from State House dated June 28th 2021 indicated that the assurance came high on the heels of President Barrow’s audience with Sultan A. Al-Marshad on his day-five official visit to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The dispatch said the President expressed gratitude to him for his institution’s support to the Gambia for more than four decades, especially for urgently responding to the country’s request for Debt Service Extension, to address the impact of COVID-19; that President Barrow equally commended him for the assistance rendered to improve the country’s infrastructure, in preparation for the OIC Summit in 2022.
“In his reassuring remarks, Sultan A. Al-Marshad said the Saudi Fund for Development is committed to providing full support to The Gambia and will ensure the accelerated release of these funds. He highlighted that the institution has a dedicated team that urgently attends to the needs of Gambia’s projects. This is in line with supporting the country’s preparatory process to host the largest gathering of Muslim leaders around the world,” the dispatch stated.
The Director of Operations at the Saudi Fund for Development Faisal M. Al Kahtani, said the fund is concurrently supporting seven projects in The Gambia, to the tune of one hundred and eighty million dollars ($180M); that they include five projects that are supported through loans and that The Gambia is the only country that has been provided with such assistance due to what he described as a “special relationship with the Gambia”, the dispatch concludes.
