Comesa backs FIUs in fight against money laundering |28 November 2014

In order to help member countries combat money laundering, Comesa (the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa) is hosting a workshop in Seychelles entitled ‘Develop capacity building action plan for Financial Intelligence Units’.

The three-day workshop, which opened on Wednesday, is being held at the Savoy Hotel and Spa at Beau Vallon and has brought together representatives from the Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Somalia, Tanzania, Seychelles, Interpol and the Indian Ocean Commission.
The reason for hosting the meeting in Seychelles is because of the role played by the country in the fight against piracy.

In the absence of Comesa’s secretary general, his message was conveyed by Elizabeth Mutunga, head of governance, peace and security within Comesa.
 
“Seychelles was one of the first countries in our region to start trying pirates in 2009 together with Kenya. In addition Seychelles hosted several national and international meetings and workshops in 2010 to curb piracy including the first regional workshop on piracy for the Eastern and Southern Africa and Indian Ocean region (ESA-IO) which was convened by Comesa and the Indian Ocean Community and which produced a comprehensive regional action plan on piracy.

 The regional action plan on piracy became the basis for the development of the Regional Maritime Security Programme (MASE). The objectives of the programme are to address the instability in Somalia led by the Inter-Governmental Authority of Development; to build capacity of the region in issues around arrests, transfer, detention and prosecution of pirates led by the East African Community; to disrupt the financial networks of the financiers of piracy led by Comesa and to build capacity of the region to undertake maritime tasks, led by the Indian Ocean Commission,” the secretary general’s message reads.

In his message the secretary general also pointed out that often-times, it is the pirates that face prosecution, while their commanders, the real kingpins, remain faceless.

“Our component is targeting the kingpins of piracy and we want to ensure that their financial activities are completely disrupted. This makes FIUs an invaluable partner to Comesa for the implementation of our component,” he said.

Comesa will be supporting capacity building of FIUs through targeted training sessions, development of strategic plans, mentorship programmes, the provision of equipment, facilitation of exchange visit and other such initiatives through the MASE programme.

“The overall objective of this workshop is to enhance maritime security in the Eastern and Southern Africa and Indian Ocean region (ESA-IO), hence contributing to the global security and create a favourable environment for economic development in the region. Our main purpose also is to prevent money laundering from piracy activities by establishing sound laws, regulations and policies,” noted Ms Mutunga.

“As a country whose strengths and vulnerabilities are distinctly maritime, Seychelles has been very active in supporting the ESA-IO regional programme and continues to play a leading role in the international response to piracy. As such, Seychelles has channeled much of its strategic counter-piracy activities through bilateral and multilateral partnership inclusive of international organisations. To date, Seychelles has signed memoranda of understanding and other counter-piracy legal instruments with countries such as the USA, China, UK, Spain, Denmark, Norway, the Indian Ocean Commission, Maldives, Somalia, and the EU etc,” noted Philippe Michaud, technical advisor in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

To note, 133 pirates have been tried in Seychelles since 2010 with 129 convictions and currently there are 14 on-going trials.  Seychelles has also worked closely with the government of Somalia and has been able to repatriate 96 prisoners to Puntland and Somaliland.

“With regard to local detention facilities, Seychelles prison has been renovated and extended to securely accommodate and incarcerate prisoners convicted of piracy,” added Mr Michaud.

Talking about the illicit financial flows, Mr Michaud pointed out that Seychelles’ FIU has a pivotal role to play in detecting illicit financial flows, thus strengthening their capacity is imperative in disrupting the financial networks of piracy activities. The new FIU was established in August 2008 and joined the Egmont Group of FIUs in July 2013.  It is a unique hybrid model encompassing an Administrative and Law Enforcement FIU model with Civil Assets Forfeiture powers. Since its establishment the FIU has been instrumental in the freezing of several suspicious accounts. From 2011 to date, assets worth over US $25.3 million (R303.6 million) have been confiscated and forfeited under the AML Act.  Such activities are a deterrent to criminals to ensure that such transnational crimes are punished appropriately.