The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the EFCC are collectively intensifying the fight against financial crimes, even as they plan to bar individuals with any record of financial or economic crime from opening bank accounts in the country.
The two entities met at the CBN headquarters in Abuja, yesterday, to discuss their experiences and challenges in the fight against economic-related crimes, as well as figure out the best ways to tackle the problem.
According to Isaac Okorafor, the Director of Corporate Communications at the CBN, the two organisations discussed strategies that would help put a stop to the appalling activities of economic saboteurs, including those smuggling of commodities like rice, textile materials, fertilizers, wheat and other items on the prohibition list for accessing foreign exchange through official window, as well as tracking illicit financial flows.
But they did not just limit their discussion on curbing illicit financial flows, as they made other plans on areas like anti-money laundry, and monitoring of politically exposed persons in the country.
The meeting, which was chaired by a Director in the CBN, Jeremiah Abue, agreed to improve the level of information-sharing and surveillance of the financial sector.
This is an impressive move by the CBN, collaborating with the Economic Financial Crime Commission to gather new ways to curb financial crimes.
This would help to monitor the flow of money in the country and also improve the Nigerian economy, since the core values of the CBN is:
“To be proactive in providing a stable framework for the economic development of Nigeria, through effective, efficient, and transparent implementation of monetary and exchange rate policy, and management of the financial sector.”
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is the Nigerian law enforcement agency that investigates financial crimes such as advance fee fraud and money laundering.
With these two strong forces coming together to tackle financial and economic issues it will be a force to reckon with.
