By Bill W. Cooper
The newly elected president of the Compliance Officers Forum of Liberia (COFL) Kojo Weeks is calling for a rigorous enforcement of existing laws on money laundering and other forms of non-compliant activities in Liberia.
Mr. Weeks who was elected recently at the COFL Annual General Meeting also stated that while is difficult to completely eradicate the menace; Liberia does have the potential to significantly reducing it.
However, Money laundering in any country, involves hiding financial assets so that they can be used without detection of the illegal activity that produces them.
Additionally, through Money laundering, criminals transform monetary proceeds derived from criminal activities into funds with an apparently legal source.
Speaking to a team of journalists after his election victory, Mr. Weeks stressed the need for a uniform “Know Your Customer” (KYC) or a single requirement in terms of documentation for all financial transactions across financial intuitions can never be overemphasized.
He further indicated that there is also a need for strong punishment for violators who are tracked down and reported to the relevant authority, as well as incentives for the respective institutions tracking down would-be money launderers.
Commenting on the challenges, he noted that most times the efforts of the organization get undermined, when the relevant authority does not act appropriately, thus putting them in harm’s way.
Mr. Weeks at the same time thanked the Bankers Association of Liberia, the Financial Intelligence Unit amongst others for the continuous support towards the organization.
Kojo Week who also served as the organization interim president prior to his election victory further disclosed that the primary objective of his leadership will be capacity-building for all compliance officers across the country.
He added that following the recent training in G+anta, Nimba County, the leadership elect will ensure more trainings and professional certifications to further build the capacity of the current and would-be compliance officers.
Meanwhile, those also elected at the Forum include Ibraheem Odesol, Vice president; Comfort Seville, General Secretary and Thelma Yoko, Financial Secretary and Peirre Nemilin as Treasurer respectively.
The Compliance Officers Forum of Liberia is an Organization set up to detect and report Money Laundering and other financial non-Compliance across Liberia.
