Harris Jr, Director General of GIABA
Ghana commended for fight against money laundering, financial crimes
Ghana has been commended for the strides it has made in the fight against money laundering and financial crimes.
The Director General of ECOWAS’ specialised institution on money-laundering, Inter-Governmental Action Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), Edwin W. Harris Jr., who made the commendation cited the establishment and works of the Financial Intelligence Centre, EOCO, investigative bodies such as the police and President Mahama’s strongest declaration of war on financial crimes, as examples of the country’s commitment towards the fight against those crimes.
He gave the commendation in an interview granted after the closing of a three-day regional training in investigative journalism on economic and financial crimes organised by GIABA for 40 journalists from various ECOWAS member states in Bissau, Guinea-Bissau.
The training was, among others, aimed at sharpening the skills of the journalists in reporting on economic and financial crimes; building a strong alliance between GIABA and the media to better disseminate information on money laundering and financial crimes and sharing regional initiatives in the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing.
“Ghana is one of the countries in our region that is a model country that other countries should look up to or is looking up to.
They are doing well. Ghana was the first to be assessed during the second round of mutual evaluation and on effectiveness side, they were one of the countries among the member states that did a little bit well.
Even though it ended up on the global money laundering and terrorist financing watchdog, Financial Action TASK Force (FATF) green list and the European Union black list, Ghana worked hard and in 2021, they were out,” he said.
Evaluation
Mr Harris said presently, GIABA had started the third round of mutual evaluation of Ghana, and though they had not finished, they had begun to see improvement in the country’s fight against money laundering and financial crimes.
Mutual evaluation is a peer-to-peer review where a country agrees for other member states to assess them to see how they are faring with regard to the fight against money-laundering, what actions have been taken, gains that have been made, the challenges and the deficits in the system.
Mr Harris explained that though the evaluation did not come with punitive action, if a country performed poorly, they could go on the FATF green list, which often sent wrong signals to investors when a country was on it.
He said for this third mutual evaluation of Ghana, the assessors would be from Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Liberia, as well as an assessor from either Germany or Italy.
Despite the strides made, he said Ghana, just like other member states, was faced with challenges; he cited the judiciary as one of the challenges.
“They may not have in-depth knowledge on anti-money laundering, financial crimes, and this makes prosecution a little bit difficult,” he said of the judiciary.
He said for that reason, GIABA, in collaboration with all member states in the sub-region, would organise a regional training for judges and prosecutors in order to provide understanding of those international crimes.
He urged relevant institutions in Ghana to support President Mahama’s declaration of war on financial crimes and money laundering, adding that that would not only help the country but would also increase peace, stability and promote shared prosperity and investment.