Section 59, The Insurance Act, 2000

(1) Notwithstanding any provision to the contrary in this Act, where an insurer transacting life insurance business exclusively or with any other insurance business intends to transfer his entire insurance business or his life insurance business to another insurer, he shall apply to the Commissioner for approval of the transfer. (2) The Commissioner may, after hearing the applicant, the insurer to whom the business is to be transferred, the policy-holders of the applicant and any other interested person as the Commissioner may think fit, approve the transfer subject to such conditions as he may specify. (3) No application shall be made to the Commissioner under subsection (1) unless— 36 No. 5 Insurance Act 2000 (a) a notice of the intention to apply had been published in the *Gazette* by the applicant; and (b) a statement of the nature of the proposed transfer together with an abstract containing the material facts related to such transfer and such other matters as may be prescribed, have been sent to each policy-holder of the proposed transferor at the same time as the publication referred to in paragraph (a). (4) A policy-holder of a transferor may, instead of becoming a policy-holder of the transferee, in writing elect— (a) to surrender his policy and accept the surrender value of the policy, whereupon the amount of the surrender value shall be paid to him; or (b) to accept a paid-up policy whereupon the actual value shall be deposited in trust with the Bank of Sierra Leone or with any person authorized in that behalf by the Bank of Sierra Leone to be made available to the policy-holder on fulfilment of the contract. [Margin: Statement after amalgamation or transfer.]