International Journal on Criminology Volume 6, Number 2, Winter 2018/Spring 2019 | Page 52

The Fight against Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing in West Africa
in West Africa. These are followed by "smuggling," "theft," "people trafficking,"
and "counterfeiting" in an equal number of reported cases. "Drug trafficking" and
"piracy" come third. Other offenses include counterfeiting, arms trafficking, embezzlement,
and illegal mining.
10. The statistics countries provide on the main money laundering predicate offenses
have remained practically unchanged over the last five years. This underlines
the difficulty of producing statistics for the region, and especially the lack of
cooperation between organizations in charge of AML/CFT issues nationally. The
reported level of ML/TF fell substantially below that generally perceived.
Trends and Data on Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing
11. The FATF recommendations require AML/CFT actors to make Suspicious
Transaction Reports (STRs) and Cash Transportation Declarations (CTDs) to Financial
Intelligence Units (FIUs), so that the latter can process and analyze this financial
information before submitting their report to the judicial authority, which
in turn can initiate AML/CFT prosecutions if required.
12. Statistics for West Africa show that only English-speaking countries follow
reporting requirements for cash transactions. It should be noted that submitting
CTDs is not a legal requirement for people in many West African countries—in
this case, in the eight UEMOA member countries who consider the whole area to
be shared. CDTs are made only at the Union's entry and exit points. This is a clear
weakness in AML/CFT systems in view of the FATF's requirements.
13. FIUs in West Africa received 4,997 STRs in 2017. Of the 4,997 STRs received,
only 1,342 (26.85 percent) were related to money laundering, while twenty-seven
were related to other economic and financial crimes. There has been a sharp
decline in money laundering cases when compared with data from the previous
three years, where an average of 60 percent of cases related directly to money laundering.
Nigeria has received the largest number of STRs: 3,554, or 71 percent of
all STRs received in 2017, of which only seventy-seven were related to ML. This is
followed by Ghana, with 599 STRs, of which 468 were related to ML; Côte d'Ivoire,
with 218 STRs all related to ML; and Togo, with 163 STRs, of which 154 were
directly related to ML.
14. Of the 4,997 STRs received, 3,761 were processed. Of these, only 210 (5.58
percent) were sent to the judicial authorities. The countries make no effort to explain
this gap. It should also be noted that there have been seventy-six AML/CFT
investigations, fifty prosecutions, and only fourteen convictions. This highlights
how limited the results of AML/CFT initiatives in West Africa remain.
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