THE Federal Government will now emphasise the seizure of proceeds of corruption and other financial crimes as a measure to further strengthen its anti-graft strategies.
The Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), who made this known in Abuja, said adoption of the measure was informed by the realisation that criminals prefer imprisonment to losing their illegally acquired wealth.
Malami spoke in a speech he sent to the Regional capacity-building workshop for law enforcement agencies on promoting best practices on structure, investigation and techniques of criminal asset seizure, freezing, confiscation, recoveries and management in compliance with United Nations Security Council Resolutions.
The workshop was put together by the Inter-Government Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA).
Malami said: “We cannot over-emphasise the importance of criminal assets confiscation or forfeiture; besides the redistribution of wealth from the criminals to legitimate use, criminal assets forfeiture can be used as a veritable means to control criminal behaviour as well as a means of deterrence against crime and as a measure of punishment for criminals.
“Many criminals fear the loss of their money and other illegally acquired wealth more than they fear the prospect of a jail term.”
President of Community Court of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Justice Edward Asante advocated for enhanced international collaborations if countries in the sub-region were to succeed in the war against financial crimes and terrorism financing.
Justice Asante, who assured of his court’s continued support for the fight against crimes and injustice in the sub-region, urged member states to always obey the court’s decisions and to increase the number of its judges.
He called for an urgent review of the statutes of GIABA, noting: “We need structures with more legitimacy and greater capacity to deal with investigations, prosecutions and possible seizures, freezing, confiscation and recovery of assets and proceeds of transnational crimes.”
GIABA’s Director General Kimelabalou Aba noted that global efforts to combat financial crimes now focus on dispossession of criminals of the proceeds of their illicit activities with the ultimate aim of taking the profit out of crime by deploying tools for forfeiture and recovery of tainted assets.
Aba, who was represented by a Director in GIABA, Buno Nduka, said: “One of the critical ways in ensuring that criminals do not take control of our financial systems, capture governmental powers and ultimately collapse them is to deprive the criminals of the proceeds of their criminal activities.
“This should be done through the confiscation and recovery of tainted property. The strategy of depriving criminals of the profits of crime through asset recovery is particularly useful in combating money laundering and the financing of terrorism and must be government priority.”