Banks are shielding corrupt persons by doctoring or hiding relevant information on them and their transactions, thereby undermining the work of anti-corruption officials, chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has said.
Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, who was speaking yesterday in Abuja at a meeting with officials of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria, said this behavior of the banks is sabotaging the EFCC.
Anti-money laundering laws require banks to turn in information on "suspicious" transactions to the EFCC, and the banks routinely post notices in their premises warning customers that certain funds movements would be reported to the authorities.
But Lamorde said yesterday that banks play hide-and-seek with investigators seeking statements of account of some suspects.
"If you send letter to the bank to avail you the details of such account, the reply you will get is that such account does not exist. If you insist, then you will be told that such records are not on the front desk, that it is only the managing director or the deputy managing director that manages the account. This is not a healthy banking development," he said.
Lamorde listed other unethical practices to include "the secrecy surrounding private banking, doctoring or non-disclosure of true position of statement of accounts of suspicious account holders and non-compliance with Know-Your-Customer, KYC, principle," a statement by EFCC spokesman Wilson Uwujaren said.
The EFCC chairman said while he appreciated the need for the banks to protect their customers, this must not be to the extent that it would harm the society in general.
"We want our society to be better. Nobody would want to be treated in an unfair manner outside the shores of this country just because he/she is carrying a green passport," he said, referring to the Nigerian international passport.
Earlier, CIBN president Segun Aina urged the EFCC to enforce the Dishonour Cheque Offences Act, which prescribes penalties for issuers of bounced cheques.
"The law is there, but people issue cheques and the cheques get bounced and nothing happens. We want to collaborate with the EFCC to ensure that the law is enforced," he said.
Aina said private banking is an arrangement where the banks gives special services to some customers who are not expected to join the queue in the banking hall, but added that there was no reason for secrecy over such accounts.
"There is no reason why the account of such customers should be made secretive and not be made available to the EFCC upon request," he said.
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This is been happening before this revelation . The unfortunate tragedy of our relentelss corruption is the action of those reposed with responsibility to protect our economy and the peoples social welbeing . We all know this as the very reason we're going through lot of impedements and stalls in developement objectives . Many nations realize the impossibilty to let this human action hold back the engine of progress and respond with equal arrays of sanctions including death penalty to stop it . Many proposals have been made to Jonathan even prior to the recent mayhem on the nations treasury with no action as usual from him and his looting bunch of advisers and culpable Law makers When Jonathan seem quick to tell his audience that he inherited Nigeria's econiomic corruption and looting character from previous administration , what an arrant nonsence excuse to hide abject incompetence ? This man did not understand that he is elected to change that social and cultural norm by declaring absolute war on corruption and looting of public funds . He was never elected to babysit evil and national shame, especially such that impede our national program. What we're hearing today under Jonathan's Presidency is worse than where he inherited the nation. His sit down and enjoy attitude has stalled our match to self sufficiency and impeded our resolve to empower citizens of this nation to take the bull by the horn . The leadership of this man has been the nations worst disaster I am sorry to say it . Perhaps he may have some teeth to make some minimal dent on the remaining segment of his unfrotunate leadership as he seem to readjust his otherwise conivance with the devil . To do so , he need to involve a wider spectrum of those within and outside his enclave . Our country is rich with sincere and concerned citizens whose only desire is to see a highly developed Nigeria and in which we can all be proud of. He has had enough of false advisers who're either too incompetent or delibrately misleading him or both. We need quick fix and effective action to hold the economic rouges and cheaters responsible wherever they are . they're inside the country to wreck havoc on our social and economic developement plans and have so far succeeded in that plot . Now it is up to Jonathan to do something to revert this audacious plot from within, they're in the Banks and all corners of strategic institutions and have no where to go .