By Ogenyi Ogenyi, Uyo
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has raised alarm over the increasing use of virtual assets by corrupt politicians and other fraudulent persons to conceal stolen funds and unexplained wealth.
The Commission however said it remained proactive and ahead technologically in the fight against such crimes with thr enormous proofs of operational successes on the issue especially the breakthrough in investigation and prosecution
of the infamous CBEX scam.
Executive Chaitman of EFCC Mr Ola Olukoyede made the revelation during a public lecture to mark the African Union Anti-Corruption Day. yesterday in Uyo with the event focusing on understanding virtual assets and investment fraud.
Olukoyede Who was represented by the Uyo Zonal Director of the EFCC, Assistant Commander of EFCC ACE I Johnson Oshodi regretted that illicit financial flows remained a monstrous challenge to African development, with annual losses running into billions of dollars with the flows coming from diverse criminal activities with illicit investment in virtual assets and investment scams another rising criminal engagement that has the potential to outpace, even money laundering, on the continent.
” It is important to clearly state that virtual assets are not fundamentally
criminal. It is when they are wrongfully or fraudulently used that they become criminal. Technology is moving at a supersonic speed around the world.
“The advent of virtual assets is a response to one of the qualities of money as a store of value. However, as with every progressive
innovation, fraudsters usually evolve ways of perverting their genuine purposes.
“Virtual assets fraud is on the rise. Our findings showed that fraudulent
politicians are already perfecting schemes and hiding their loot in
cryptocurrencies to beat the investigative dragnets of anti- corruption agencies.
“Stolen funds and unexplained wealth are being warehoused in
wallets and payments for services are being done through this window. Investment schemes are also being facilitated through it.” The chairman explained.
Investment fraud, like virtual assets Olukoyede said has also brgan to spread like wildfire across Africa with fraudsters exploiting vulnerabilities of desperate investors to defraud them through various dishonest schemes.
“The lessons derivable from the CBEX situation are very clear: the
investing public do inadvertently aid fraudulent practices through lack due diligence on schemes advertised to them. Another lesson is that investors hardly send suspicious transaction reports to the EFCC until they are defrauded. We must understand that no investment scam can succeed without the negligence of investors.” He said.
The Commission, the chairman said would continue to work to engage every stakeholder in its preventive and investigative activities adding that virtual assets and investment fraud like other fraudulent activities remained preventable with the escape route being adequate knowledge and understanding of issues involved.
The keynote lecture at the event was delivered by ACE II Emeka Ukpai while an interactive session afforded participants the
opportunity to rub minds with experts.
‘The window of ignorance which fraudulent investment operators are opening to defraud i bennocent members of the public should be closed.” He concluded.
