The Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) has advocated for government to implement the beneficial ownership registry as promised.
The Executive Director of CISLAC, Mr. Auwal Musa (Rafsanjani), said the call was in partnership Transparency International chapter in Nigeria, adding that the international community should also support these efforts.
He noted that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has made critical steps towards addressing corruption in the programming and policy implementation.
He said this will be discussed at a special session titled Public Registers of Beneficial Ownership: Essential or Overhyped at the World Bank/ International Monetary Fund Annual Membership Meeting in Washington, DC, United States.
He said CISLAC in collaboration with International partners, considers publicly accessible registers of true owners of companies, trusts and other commercial entities as an essential tool in the fight against corruption.
He said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has made critical steps towards addressing corruption in the programming and policy implementation.
“We commend IMF for working together with Transparency International and other partners to develop a methodology for assessing the nature and severity of governance weaknesses.
“Firstly, we call on IMF and all other multilateral and bilateral partners to develop and implement clear and transparent anti-corruption policy, which will facilitate policy-recommendations targeting systemic and coherent anti-corruption and transparency measures.
“Secondly, in the context of weak institutions, pervasive corruption, the penetration of organized crime into national governance structures and state capture by criminal networks and individual kleptocrats, civil society organisations should be consulted in the process of governance assessment and policy responses.
“CSOs, governments and development partners must work jointly especially in areas of i) fiscal governance, ii) Public Procurement, iii) Rule of Law, iv) Anti-Money Laundering and Combatting Facilitation of Corruption,” he said .
