Ibrahim Magu, acting Chairman of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), has issued warning to financial institutions to avoid laundering illicit funds for corrupt politicians and criminals.
In a statement made available to newsmen on Friday by Mr Tony Orilade, Commission’s Acting Head, Media and Publicity said Magu issued the warning during the general meeting of the Association of Chief Compliance Officers of Banks In Nigeria (ACCOBIN) held in Lagos.
Magu stated that many politicians, who stole the commonwealth had begun to repatriate their loot to the country for the purpose of influencing the elections through vote buying and compromising of election officers.
The EFCC chairman then called on members of the group to join hands with the Commission to ensure that the coming elections were not compromised to avert the negative impacts that might follow.
Magu in his words said, “we are all under a civic duty to comply with our various responsibilities and ensure that we do the needful to obey the laws and regulations governing the elections.”
He further added that political inducement had taken other forms under different names such as “stomach Infrastructure”, “empowerment schemes”, “non-interest yielding loans” and “outright cash hand-outs”.
Magu described members of the group as stakeholders in the fight against corruption and said, “your obligations are not different from your usual filing of suspicious transactions reports to the relevant authorities.”
