The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC , has called on financial institutions across the country to strengthen their collaboration with the Commission towards ridding the nation of economic and financial crimes and other acts of corruption as share on the EFFC X handle .
This charge was given on Tuesday, April 29, 2025 in Port Harcourt, Rivers State by the Acting
Zonal Director of EFCC, Assistant Commander of the EFCC, ACE1 Adebayo Adeniyi
while addressing bank compliance officers. He admonished them to always carry
out their duties of conducting Customer
Due Diligence and Know your Customers in order to strengthen the fight against
corruption.
He also charged them
to take their job seriously, ensure good collaboration with the Commission,
good ethical conduct, honesty and accountability while dealing with their
customers. He tasked them to always remind their customers that those who fail
to comply with due diligence and KYC principles
would be sanctioned.
"It is important to remind banks of their critical
roles as major stakeholders in the fight against corruption and that there is a
need for the Commission and the banks to work together", he said. He pointed out that issues of identifying bank customers and for
banks to update records of their customers are very important to facilitate
investigation processes.
He specifically
cautioned account officers against
encouraging internet fraudsters to commit fraud through multiple
accounts creation or alerting their customers that they are under
investigation by the EFCC or that their accounts have been flagged. “In as much
as you have to protect the bank, don't do so at the detriment of the nation, do
not protect the bank and destroy the image of your own family and that of the
society", he said.
Responding, one of the compliance officers, Edward Keto,
appreciated the efforts of the Commission adding that “ it is a
privilege to have this kind of meeting with the Commission and it will help in
dealing professionally with our customers”.
