TheCable

The federal executive council (FEC) has given approval for the creation of an agency to manage the proceeds of crime in the country.

Speaking with reporters after the FEC meeting on Wednesday, Abubakar Malami, attorney-general of the federation (AGF), said he had been directed to send the bill entitled “Proceeds of Crime Recovery and Management Agency” to the national assembly.

Malami said the proceeds of crimes are currently being managed by the Department of State Services (DSS) and the anti-graft agencies.

The AGF said the bill when passed, would provide transparency in the way proceeds of crimes are handled.

“It is targeted and intended to have in place legal and institutional framework,” Malami said.

“The legal component of it is having a law while the institutional component of it is to have an agency that will be saddled with the responsibility of managing the assets that constitute proceeds of crime in Nigeria.

“What happens before now is that proceeds of crime are scattered all over, and mostly in the hands of different and multiple agencies of government inclusive of the police, the DSS, EFCC, and ICPC.

“So, with that kind of arrangement which is adhoc, there is no agency of government that is saddled with the responsibility of data generation, an agency that can give you offhand the number of landed assets, immovable assets, the amount in cash that are recovered by the federal government by way of interim forfeiture or final forfeiture.”

Malami said information on all the proceeds of crime would be easily available when the agency is established.

“It will be a one-stop-shop arrangement by which all the assets that are recovered arising from crimes that are indeed vested in the federal government, you have a one-stop arrangement where you can have information,” he said.