Politics
THE Federal Government has begun the implementation of Anti-Money Laundering (AML), Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) and Counter-Proliferation Financing (CPF) Data Management Platform project.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the project is aimed at removing Nigeria from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) Grey List by 2025.
Nigeria was included in the FATF Grey List in February, 2023.
The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) was mandated by President Bola Tinubu to lead the implementation.
NITDA is expected to build better systems to manage financial data and compliance in Nigeria in collaboration with the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU).
Malam Kashifu Inuwa, Director-General of NITDA, at the inaugural meeting for the project implementation, said the project would address deficiencies identified in Nigeria’s Mutual Evaluation Report (MER).
Inuwa explained that FATF placed Nigeria on the grey list because of seven issues, which included the rising capital inflows, shortcomings in combating money laundry, shortcoming and inability to combat arms financing.
“We had shortcomings in combating terrorism financing, anti-money laundering regime, counter terrorism financing regime, deficiency in our counter proliferation financing regime.
“The main objective of building a better system is to help us with global compliance; to help Nigeria position itself as a key player in the global effort to combat financial terrorism and other crimes.
“This will help us to create visibility in Nigeria, as well as improve our global reputation and relationship in financial market,” he said.
He said the project would improve national security that had the capacity to track illicit financial flow, disrupt criminal networks in the financial sector, strengthen law enforcement, the economy and encourage investment.
Inuwa emphasised on Tinubu’s commitment to combating corruption and financial crime through innovation and technology.
Rep. Stanley Adedeji, Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on ICT and Cyber security, underscored the value of technology, saying that Nigeria deserved to lead in cutting-edge technologies.
Adedeji assured that the National Assembly would ensure that projects as such gained the deserved funding.
“We are going to make sure that the right funding is put in place for this project without any doubt.
“We are also going to make sure that if there are any laws today that are going to impede or be a stumbling block to what this project stands to achieve; we have to go and amend those laws.
“If there are things that require executive orders so that we can quickly move forward, we will do whatever needs to be done,” he said.
Hajiya Hafsat Bakari, Director-General of NFIU, called for more collaboration among stakeholders to sustain the gains of exiting the grey list.
According to Bakari, the grey list is not just a one-off project, but a continuous project.
“The next cycle of evaluation will be done in 2027 and we do not want a situation where after exiting the grey list, we still find ourselves in the next evaluation.
“This is why we have decided that the use of technology will give credibility to every statistics that we have, not just to our domestic stakeholders, but also to our international partners.
“Everything should be done in real time–accessible, credible and factual; that is the project that we are doing today,” she said. (NAN)
A.I
Jan. 17, 2025
Tags: FATF Grey List NITDA
