Tackling Illicit Financial Flows Is A Matter of Survival For Africa’s Development – Shuabu Idris

 

The chairman, board of Governors, institute of directors centre for corporate governance, Alhaji Shuaibu Idris has said that Tackling illicit financial flows is a matter of survival for Africa’s development. 

 

Speaking at the communique on the public and private sector roundtable discussion in his speech titled ‘Laundering/Countering Terrorist Financing (AML/CFT) and curbing illicit financial flows in Nigeria and West Africa.’, Chairman, IoD Centre For Corporate Governance said that the The Centre is committed to promoting and improving good Corporate Governance standards in Nigeria through advocacy, advisory services, research, and high-quality training for board members and executives in public and private sector organisations.

 

” Tackling illicit financial flows is a matter of survival for Africa’s development. Africa not only loses about 5% of continental GDP annually to illicit capital flights but the proliferation of illicit financial flows enables terrorist activity and insecurity from the Lake Chad region which includes Nigeria spanning the Sahel region. The losses to economic growth, trade opportunities, and social development is therefore unquantifiable. This constitutes a drain on Africa’s foreign exchange reserves, reduce efforts to enhance domestic resource mobilization, contract investment inflows and contribute to low social development indicators including poverty and inequality.

It is a collective responsibility and a priority for the private sector, civil society and government to address systemic challenges and gaps undermining the efforts to curb IFF and ML/TF including lack of transparency, weak accountability mechanisms, under capacity, resource mismatch, and others that can be identified through dialogue and strategic engagements on this nature.

 

 

The focal point of discussion “Empowering “Gatekeepers” and weakening “Enablers” caught my attention and I look forward to a great discussion on this very important subject matter.

 

I am delighted with the choice of panelists and moderators and have no doubt that at the end of today’s programme resolutions that will touch on the major elements of discuss will be brought to fore and the Centre will take it to the next level. I must commend CIPE and the Centre’s Management for championing events such as this which lends credence to the propagation of sound Corporate Governance principles and practices, been the core mandate of the Centre.

 

IoDCCG is a collaborative project of the Institute of Directors Nigeria (IoD), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and the Corporate Affairs Commission ” He said