Senate Moves against Funding of Criminals, Terrorists

….Bill passes second reading

Deji Elumoye

The Senate yesterday at the plenary moved against illicit funding for criminals and terrorists as it considered a bill that would disrupt the financial flow and funding of criminal enterprise and terrorist financing in Nigeria through the seizure of assets and monies marked as proceeds of crime.

The bill entitled: ‘Proceeds of Crime Bill, 2021,’ and sponsored by the Senate Leader, Senator Yahaya Abdullahi, passed second reading and was referred to relevant committee for further legislative work.

Leading debate on the bill, Senator Abdullahi said it seeks to provide for a comprehensive legal and institutional framework for the recovery and management of proceeds of crime or benefits derived from unlawful activities.

He explained that its passage and assent into law would harmonise and consolidate the legal provisions on the recovery of proceeds of crime in Nigeria.

According to the ranking Senator, Nigeria had severally attempted to put in place an appropriate Proceeds of Crime legislation since 2007.

He said: “Efforts to develop a comprehensive bill have been impeded by agency rivalry since 2011.

The effort to sign the Proceeds of Crime Bill into law in 2019 was delayed as a result of complaints by agencies that claimed that the Bill is intended to take away their powers”.

He noted that, during the evaluation of Nigeria in 2007 by the International Financial Action Task Force (FATF), they observed in their report that the legal framework for the recovery and management of stolen assets in Nigeria is inadequate and do not comply with international standards.

Abdullahi lamented that due to lack of centrally managed database on recovered assets, effort to track and maintain the actual number of the seized assets, their location and their value is made difficult.

According to him, there have been reported and verifiable instances over the years that showed that some recovered assets were being misused, stolen or lost while further investigations have shown that some of the agencies opened multiple accounts for the payment of forfeited assets without keeping proper records.

He added that It was against this background that President Buhari constituted the Presidential Audit Committee on Recovery of Assets (PACRA) in 2017.

“Not surprisingly, the committee’s findings re-iterated the need for comprehensive and more innovative approach in the management of recovered assets in a transparent and accountable manner so that these assets would become a source of revenue for the country as is the case in many developing and developed countries of the world”, he said.

Contributing, the Minority Leader, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, commended the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration for the move to have the Proceeds of Crime bill introduced and passed by the National Assembly.

He said: “It is not very unusual to see me get up here and commend this government for bringing an executive bill that is in the interest of the country. But this is one of those bills that I want to commend the APC government for taking a step in the right direction, so that we can deal comprehensively with the matter of corruption in Nigeria”.

The bill after scaling second reading, was referred by the President of the Senate, Dr. Ahmad Lawan, to the Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters headed by Senator Opeyemi Bamidele and is to report back at plenary in two weeks.

Two other bills also on Tuesday scaled second reading during Senate plenary

They are: The National Payment System Bill; and A bill for an Act to provide for the establishment of the Federal University of Agriculture Mpu, Enugu State.

Both bills are sponsored by Senators Sadiq Suleiman Usman (APC, Kwara North); and Ike Ekweremadu (PDP, Enugu West).