Nigeria Close To Exiting FATF Grey List by Meeting 37 of 40 AML Standards

The Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) announced that Nigeria is progressing in combating terrorism financing and money laundering by scoring additional grades, and targets to be removed from the FATF “Grey List” by 2025.

NFIU has declared that Nigeria is included under compliant (C ) and Largely Compliant (LC) in 37 out of 40 FATF recommendations, removing itself from the partially compliant category.

The NFIU also revealed that Nigeria’s commendable achievements were acknowledged at the 42nd meeting of the “Economic Community of West African States” (ECOWAS) technical commission — Inter-Governmental Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA) — held from November 17th and 23rd in Freetown, Sierra Leone.

This recognition describes Nigeria’s commitment to meeting international standards and its approach to addressing financial crimes.

In 2023, Nigeria was placed on the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) grey list due to a rise in capital inflows and deficiencies in its anti-money laundering (AML), counter-terrorism financing (CTF), and counter-proliferation financing regime.

A recent FATF plenary session acknowledged Nigeria’s effort to strengthen its legal and regulatory framework. As a result, five key recommendations were upgraded from “Partially Compliant” to “Largely Compliant.”

The specific recommendations that saw improvement include:

• Recommendation 23: Other Measures Relevant to Designated Non-Financial Businesses and Professionals (DNFBP’s).
• Recommendation 24: Transparency and Beneficial Ownership of Legal Persons
• Recommendation 25: Transparency and Beneficial Ownership of Legal Arrangements
• Recommendation 28: Regulation and Supervision of DNFBPs
• Recommendation 32: Cash Couriers

NFIU CEO “ Hafsat Bakari” led Nigeria’s delegation to attend the plenary. She was determined to address the remaining AML/CFT regime deficiencies. Nigeria has been greylisted 3 times, which is enough for a country, she said.

She also spoke about rising financial crime that is considered a threat to both global & national security, the interconnected nature of these crimes & the need for effective collaboration among stakeholders to address these challenges.

“Nigeria and the global community face an interconnected web of financial crimes that undermine our economic integrity and facilitate the spread of illicit goods,”

Hafsat Bakari

She also emphasized that these threats often exploit regulatory gaps, hindering stakeholder collaboration.

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Brig. Gen. E.A. Aladeniji, Director of Operations in Defence Intelligence, emphasized the ongoing collaboration with the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) to strengthen investigative efforts.

While acknowledging the increasing complexity of financial crimes due to technological advancements, he expressed optimism that forums like this would facilitate knowledge sharing and build stronger stakeholder connections.

Representatives from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Corporate Affairs Commission also participated in the discussions, reinforcing the need for inter-agency cooperation in building a more secure financial environment, the press release states.

The event aimed to bring together public and private sector entities to discuss strategies for effectively combating financial crime and protecting Nigeria’s national security.