West Africa must work closely with allies to counter money laundering

Gen. Gowon (R) presents GIABA's reports to President Mahama

Source: Globalnewsreel.com

Former Nigeria Head of State, Gen. Yakubu Gowon said it has become very crucial for the West African sub-region to work closely with key allies in the fight against money laundering and financing of terrorism.

He stressed that establishing networks and building international cooperation may be the possible frameworks to address the canker.

Addressing the 12th Inter-Ministerial Committee Meeting, organized by the Inter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA) last Saturday in Accra, Gen. Gowon observed that “the global nature of economic and financial crimes are such that no nation can fight the problem alone,” hence the need for increased vigilance to tackle the issue.

Also the founding father of ECOWAS, Gen. Gowon acknowledged the committee’s effort in providing active policy guidelines towards the implementation of GIABA’s mandate of protecting the financial systems and “by extension, the national economy of member States from the laundering of proceeds of crime and preventing the financing of terrorism.”

He launched the Status Report on Operations of GIABA 2004 – 2013 and the GIABA 2012 Annual Report – a compendium of GIABA’s performance and achievements.

The Inter-ministerial committee is the main policy making body of the community institutions.

In its 8 years of existence, the former Head of State indicated that GIABA had remained focused on its mandate and executed it to the benefit of the region.

The growing level of sophistication of social vices and predicate crimes like high level of corruption, internet fraud and human trafficking, he emphasized, had negative repercussions on society, bringing into disrepute such values as honesty, integrity and good character.

In addition, he argued that behind the rising rate of crime, it generally tends to derail the democratic processes in any part of the sub-region or Africa as a whole.

Thus, “we cannot over emphasize the important role of GIABA to integrate our region with the rest of the world in the war against any crime especially, terrorism.”

“I am aware that GIABA has done a good job in raising awareness, establishing structures and supporting member States to build both structural and human capacity to address the afore mentioned menaces in our sub-region of West Africa.”

Ghana’s President John Mahama, who officially opened the meeting, said money laundering was not an entirely new phenomenon in the sub-region and the African continent.

According to him, “the negative effect of money laundering has no respect for territorial boundary and that is why there is the need for all of us to put together resources and energy to confront the problem in all forms.”

President Mahama continued that the turn of events had made Ghana very committed to combating money laundering and terrorist financing.

“Accepting the challenge to host this event therefore is an illustration of our commitment to the sub-regional and indeed, the global effort to address this economic and security threat,” he stated.

Mr. Mahama reiterated Ghana’s determination and commitment as well as being resolute to fighting money laundering and the financing of terrorism.

He assured the group that Ghana would continue to collaborate in its quest to making money laundering and the financing of terrorism unattractive to perpetrators in the sub-region.

“Let us collectively ensure that criminals do not use our jurisdiction to perpetrate their criminal activity. In our respective countries, we must ensure that law enforcement agencies are sufficiently empowered and resourced to detect and act proactively on suspicious activity.”

Vladimir Nechaev, Vice president of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) also commended GIABA for the work done jointly with his outfit on the project of typologies of the financing of terrorism in West Africa.

He urged countries in the region to carry out the necessary reforms in order to effectively fight money laundering and terrorist financing.

Maintaining that, every failure in a country’s AML/CFT system threatens not only that country but also, the regional and international financial sectors.

Mr. Nechaev further welcomed Ghana’s reforms to criminalize money laundering and terrorist financing, the establishment of an operational and functioning financial intelligence unit as well as the adoption and implementation of adequate procedures to identify and freeze terrorist assets.