{"id":2567,"date":"2022-03-25T12:12:36","date_gmt":"2022-03-25T12:12:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/?p=2567"},"modified":"2022-03-25T12:12:40","modified_gmt":"2022-03-25T12:12:40","slug":"senate-passes-money-laundering-prohibition-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/senate-passes-money-laundering-prohibition-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Senate Passes Money Laundering Prohibition Bill"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Nigerian Senate on 16th<\/sup> March 2022, passed the Money Laundering (Prevention & Prohibition) Bill 2022. The bill seeks to\u00a0 repeal the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act, 2011 and enact the Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act 2022. This followed consideration of two consolidated Senate bills (SB. 642 and SB. 789) on the subject, which passed second reading in November 2021, with a public hearing conducted on 17th<\/sup> February 2022. Senate Bill 642 is sponsored by Sen. Suleiman Abdu Kwari (APC: Kaduna) and seeks to provide for the establishment of the Bureau for\u00a0Money\u00a0Laundering\u00a0Control (BMLC) domiciled in the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU), while Senate Bill 789 is sponsored by Sen. Sadiq Suleiman Umar (APC: Kwara )and \u00a0seeks to provide a legal framework to establish the Special Control Unit Against\u00a0Money\u00a0Laundering\u00a0(SCUML) under the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to implement the money laundering provisions under this Act with regards to designated non-financial businesses and professions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill \nprovides for an effective and comprehensive legal and institutional framework\nto support the fight against money laundering in the country by leveraging on\nprevention, prohibition, prosecution and punishment of offenders. It also\nprovides for the protection of employees of various institutions, bodies and\nprofessions who may discover acts of money laundering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill prohibits cash transactions and electronic\ntransfer of money (to and from Nigeria) in excess of prescribed sums and\nrequires financial institutions to report transactions above these limits. Individuals\nare also required to declare to the Nigeria Custom Service, the import or\nexport of cash or a negotiable instrument above a stipulated sum. The Nigeria\nCustom Service is expected to report such declaration to SCUML and the Central\nBank of Nigeria. The bill criminalises\nrefusal to make a declaration or making a false declaration. The punishment for\ndefault is a forfeiture of undeclared funds or negotiable instrument or\nimprisonment for a term not less than two years or both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill requires financial institutions and\ndesignated non-financial businesses and professions to identify and assess\nrisks of money laundering and terrorism financing which may arise in relation\nto the development of new products and new business practices. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill also introduces certain supervisory and\nenforcement mechanisms through the imposition of administrative penalties for\nbreach of requirements imposed by law. On the other hand, it provides for\nprotection of persons and institutions that discover and report acts of money\nlaundering. No criminal or civil action can be instituted against a financial\ninstitution, designated non-financial business and profession, supervisory\nbody, the Federal Inland Revenue Service or any other person that makes a\nreport, and this includes the directors and employees acting on behalf of the\nabove listed institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Penalties for committing offences related to money\nlaundering as stipulated in the bill include imprisonment for a term not less\nthan seven years without the option of fine for individuals, a fine not less\nthan N50 million Naira for financial institutions and fine of not less than N25\nmillion Naira for a designated non-financial business and profession. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill also seeks to establish the Special\nControl Unit Against Money Laundering (SCUML)  under the EFCC to\nimplement its provisions in relation to designated non-financial businesses and\nprofessions. SCUML was established in 2005 under the Federal Ministry of\nIndustry, Trade and Investment and domiciled in the EFCC. The bill if assented\nto, will resolve institutional issues regarding the establishment of SCUML. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its report on the bill, the Senate Committee on\nAnti-Corruption and Financial Crimes noted that the there was a need to show Nigeria\u2019s\ncommitment and effectiveness with regard to its legal framework for Anti-Money\nLaundering\/Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML\/CFT), through passage of\nthe bill into law. This will then enable the country meet the requirements of\nthe Financial Action Task Force (FATF)\u2019s International Cooperation Review Group\n(ICRG) one-year observation period, during which the country is expected to\ndemonstrate significant improvement in its  AML\/CFT legal regime. In addition, the bill\nwill enable Nigeria to favourably exit the Enhanced Follow-up Process of the\nInter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa\n(GIABA). <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Nigerian Senate on 16th March 2022, passed the Money Laundering (Prevention & Prohibition) Bill 2022. The bill seeks to\u00a0 repeal the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act, 2011 and enact the Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act 2022. This followed consideration of two consolidated Senate bills (SB. 642 and SB. 789) on the subject, which passed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2561,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2567","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2567"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2567\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2574,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2567\/revisions\/2574"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}