The Corporate Affairs Commission has pledged to strengthen its relationship with the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit to ensure Nigeria exits the Financial Action Task Force’s grey list.
This was disclosed by the The Registrar-General and Chief Executive Officer of the CAC, Ishaq Magaji, on Friday while receiving the Director/CEO of the NFIU, Hafsat Bakari, on a courtesy visit.
CAC In a post on its official handle on X, said that Magaji approved the immediate set-up of a joint committee with the NFIU and a committed desk to handle all its matters.
Magaji asked the NFIU to ensure that the application programming interface provided by the CAC is optimally used.
He used the avenue to ask for knowledge sharing and capacity building of it’s staff.
In order to make it more efficient, the CAC Director pointed out that a review of the existing Memorandum of Understanding would be carried out.
Meanwhile, the Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Finance Intelligence Unit, Hafsat Bakari, Hafsat Bakari admitted the strong bond between the National Financial Intelligence Unit and the CAC as regards to the fight against money laundering, illicit financial flows or other serious criminal activities in the country.
Bakari said, “As an agency that relies on access to reliable and high-quality data, the NFIU was pleased with the strides made by the CAC in developing a world-class Beneficial Ownership Information Register.”
She further said that the BOI is crucial for NFIU and law enforcement agencies, they utilise it to trace and identify the beneficiaries of illicit proceeds.
Therefore, in order to support the efforts of the Federal Government towards Nigeria’s exit from the FATF grey list as soon as possible, Bakari calls for enhanced cooperation between both agencies.
The NFIU boss, explained that CAC’s role is crucial as two of the 15 items on its action plan fall squarely within the sphere of the commission.
