Magu cautions banks against money laundering, terror financing

The Acting Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr Ibrahim Magu, has called on financial institutions to avoid laundering illicit funds for corrupt politicians and criminals.

In a statement, the Commission’s Acting Head, Media and Publicity, Mr Tony Orilade in Abuja on Thursday, said Magu gave the charge during the general meeting of the Association of Chief Compliance Officers of Banks In Nigeria (ACCOBIN) held in Lagos.

Magu said many politicians, who stole the commonwealth had begun to repatriate their loot to the country for the purpose of influencing the elections through vote buying and compromising of election officers.

The EFCC boss urged members of the group to join hands with the Commission to ensure that the coming elections were not compromised to avert the negative impacts that might follow.

Magu said, “we are all under a civic duty to comply with our various responsibilities and ensure that we do the needful to obey the laws and regulations governing the elections.”

He said political inducement had taken other forms under different names such as “stomach Infrastructure”, “empowerment schemes”, “non-interest yielding loans” and “outright cash hand-outs”.

Magu described members of the group as stakeholders in the fight against corruption and said, “your obligations are not different from your usual filing of suspicious transactions reports to the relevant authorities.”

The Vice-President of ACCOBIN, Mr Wumi Adeniyi, expressed gratitude to Magu for honouring the invitation to the event.

Adeniyi, who is also the Chief Compliance Officer, (CCO) Heritage Bank Plc, commended Magu for his “boldness to fight corruption and economic and financial crimes in the country”.

He highlighted some of the challenges facing bank compliance officers and sought the assistance of EFCC to tackle them.

“We encounter a lot of legal burdens, particularly as it concerns the arrest and detention of compliance officers, among others,” Adeniyi said.