The Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit has urged banks, insurance companies, fintech firms, Virtual Asset Service Providers and other financial sector stakeholders to support a new Public-Private Partnership framework designed to strengthen Nigeria’s efforts to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and illicit financial flows.

The initiative was unveiled during a high-level private sector engagement in Lagos, supported by the British High Commission and the Convention for Business Integrity, according to a statement shared by the NFIU on its official X account.

The meeting brought together regulators, financial institutions, technology companies, fintech operators, insurers and cryptocurrency businesses to discuss practical measures for strengthening public-private collaboration in the fight against financial crimes.

Representing the NFIU Chief Executive Officer, Hajia Hafsat Abubakar Bakari, the agency’s General Counsel, Felix Obiamalu, urged participants to play an active role in developing the proposed Joint Financial Intelligence Collaboration framework.

He said the initiative would strengthen information sharing and intelligence exchange between government agencies and private-sector operators, helping to improve Nigeria’s capacity to detect and disrupt financial crimes.

“There is a need to collaborate to help shape the proposed Joint Financial Intelligence Collaboration (JFIC), a framework designed to enhance information sharing between the public and private sectors,” Obiamalu stated.

The event also featured a keynote address by Xolisile Khanyile, former Chair of the Egmont Group, who stressed that trust, shared ownership and effective collaboration were essential to building effective financial intelligence partnerships.

Participants welcomed the initiative and reaffirmed their commitment to collective efforts to protect the integrity of Nigeria’s financial system and strengthen its Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism framework.

The call for deeper public-private collaboration follows the NFIU’s recent deployment of its locally developed financial intelligence software, Ilivro, to Guinea-Bissau’s Financial Intelligence Unit, CENTIF Guinea-Bissau.

The NFIU said the platform provides a secure system for the electronic receipt, analysis and dissemination of financial intelligence, covering the full intelligence cycle from the submission of reports to operational action.