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The Society for Professional Valuation SPV, in commemoration of the United Nations Global Anti-Corruption Day has called on Nigeria’s anti-corruption agencies to up-scale their efforts in the fight against money laundering in the country.
The Association’s Chairman, Board of Trustees, Otunba Sola Enitan, a registered estate surveyor and valuer who made this call at a press conference held at the association’s office in Ikeja, Lagos, noted that for any country to grow economically, the fight against money laundering must be thorough. “Money laundering effects on a nation’s economy are enormous”, he said.
According to him, the effects of this scourge on economic growth among others include, loss of economic policy, erosion of financial institution systems, weakening of the financial sectors and evasion of tax.
Highlighting the causes of money laundering, Enitan said they include a high share of the population and businesses which harbour unofficial income and the existence of the black market, pointing out that corruption is prevalent among state executive, law enforcement and judicial authorities.
According to him, the causes also include anonymous cash accounts and financial instruments, including shares and bonds, insufficient requirements for transparency of financial transactions and ownership of assets, limitation of opportunity for financial information exchange with foreign law enforcement agencies.
Others are wide use of operations by enterprises, banks with offshore companies, imperfections in the regulation of foreign exchange transactions and other cash transactions, the inadequacy of monitoring mechanism for activities of financial institutions, non-compliance with international financial management standards developed by specialized international organizations and legislative securing of the financial transaction secrecy.
He said his professional body has suggested remedies for curbing the menace as follows- That
public officials must declare their assets before and after their term in office and an independent body such as ICPC should ensure their declaration is true and declaration be made public.
That pre- and post-construction development appraisal ought to be done to clear issues of over and under invoicing, that procurement officers of private and public institutions ought to be held accountable through professional certification and strict ethical conduct.
The remedies include that EFCC and NFIU to have an online land registry to which a catalogue of all titled properties nationwide will be seated. Owners of lands and properties will be known with cover ups exposed and their sources of wealth fully disclosed, EFCC should work concertedly with global agencies like FBI,CIA, MI5&6 etc. to report suspicious movement of funds in account suspected of belonging to Nigerians across globe and all suspicious transaction be reported to the appropriate authority.
According to the body, EFCC should liaise with CCB with respect to the assets declaration of public officials and civil servants. More than 2.5 million civil servants have undisclosed assets,
valuation of properties of public officers and civil servants should be a major focus for EFCC, while anticipatory asset declaration should be forbidden through a deliberate process of valuation before declaration and valuation review as verification among others.
The renowned estate surveyor and valuer further stated that a central Online Land Registry that simply shows who owns what property would go a long way to creating greater transparency over the origins of money in the market, particularly when it includes the names of real beneficiaries of the property.
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