Money laundering: FG to begin profiling of NGOs

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The Federal Government is to begin the profiling of some
non-profit organisations (NGOs) in the country, in order to ensure
compliance with regulations against money laundering and terrorist
financing.

Mr Francis Usani, Director, Nigerian Financial intelligence Unit
(NFIU) said this at a regional workshop on money laundering
organised by the Inter-Governmental Action Group Against Money
Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), on Wednesday, in Abuja.

Usani who is also the National Correspondent of GIABA, said that
the profiling would address some “deficient NGOs” in the
country.

According to him, “Recently, the budget office is doing
something to address some deficient NGOs and also engaging the NFIU
to profile some NGOs in the country.

“This is going to be a continuous exercise to profile and see
the NGOs that are actually committed to their main cause and those
not committed to any cause; these will probably be delisted and
maybe their registrations be removed.

“There has been this misunderstanding by some NGOs who had come
out to oppose the regulations put in place by the government but
these are for international best practices.

“We cannot just let NGOs to run around the streets of Nigeria
unmonitored or uncoordinated otherwise this will lead to serious
problems.”

He added that the workshop was pertinent to ensure consistency
in sensitising non-profit organisations to their obligations.

He said that the workshop would also make NGOs better acquainted
with the requirements of Anti-Money Laundering/Combating the
Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) regulations.

“It is just very crucial that NGOs need to be sensitised because
most of them do not really understand their obligations under the
AML/ CFT regulations and laws.

“Like obligations to report transactions to the relevant
authorities, to keep record of their transactions, to conduct due
diligence on their sponsors.

“These are necessary because they could ignorantly receive donor
funds from people whose aims are basically to finance terrorism or
maybe cause some kind of mayhem.”

The 3-day workshop is aimed at developing effective frameworks
and structure to fight against money laundering and terrorist
financing through non-profit organisations.

The Director-General of GIABA, Mr Kimelabalou Aba said the
workshop was a follow-up to a previous regional workshop on
preventing terrorist abuse of non-profit organisations held Lome,
Togo, in 2017.

Aba recalled that the 2017 workshop highlighted gaps in the
implementation of AML/CFT requirements by NGOs.

“Lately we have noticed that NPOs have been used by terrorists
or terrorist organisations in order to raise funds; it is within
that framework GIABA organised this workshop.

“This workshop is directed towards reporting entities namely
NPOs in order to help to be better equipped so as not to be used
for terrorist purposes.”

He also reiterated the organisation’s support to member
countries to fight the menace of terrorist financing and money
laundering.

“Our efforts are no doubt yielding results, nonetheless, the
dynamic nature of the criminal world and the continuing menace of
terrorism and terrorist financing make it imperative for us to keep
partnering and exploring better ways to deal effectively with the
problems.”