On January 5, 2023, the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) is scheduled to release new rules on cash withdrawals from all government accounts.
The NFIU was putting the essential safeguards in place in December 2022 to halt cash withdrawals from the bank accounts of the federal, state, and municipal governments.
This disclosure was made by Modibbo Tukur, the Director and Chief Executive Officer of the NFIU, during a discussion with Prof. Mahmud Yakubu, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, in Abuja.
He said, “Because of the consistent devaluation of the naira and the introduction of a new naira policy, section one of the Money Laundering Prohibition Act is automatically activated.”
Tukur added that the majority of cash withdrawals from government accounts, including payments for estacode, frequently exceed the amount permitted by the Money Laundering Act.
He said that this made innocent public employees criminally accountable. He continued by saying that the NFIU is drafting a recommendation for the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, all governors, and chairmen of local government councils to instruct all public employees to open domiciliary and naira accounts before the policy goes into effect and becomes mandated by law.
He also denied rumors that the NFIU will close the Federal Government’s accounts in January 2023, saying that governors and council chairmen will need to arrange training for market men and women on how to utilize ATM and POS services.
According to its “suspicious transaction report/suspect activity report,” the NFIU detected suspicious transactions worth at about N150 trillion between January and March 2022 in November 2022.
The development came after the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and NFIU officials disclosed that they had stepped up their surveillance of political parties’ and their candidates’ campaign expenditures in the run-up to the 2023 elections.
