The Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit, NFIU, has denied writing banks to seek the account details of the country’s judges and those of the federal legislators, contrary to media reports on Friday.
A statement by NFIU’s Chief Media Analyst, Ahmed Dikko, late on Friday said the unit “does not need to write banks for details” of people’s accounts.
Mr Dikko explained that the NFIU Act, 2018, has given the unit the power to access people’s bank accounts without any hindrance.
He said “reporting entities,” especially investigative and law enforcement agencies rather rely on the unit for the account details of individuals or corporate bodies.
According to the statement, “the attention of the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit, NFIU, has been drawn to media reports stating that the unit has requested banks to furnish it with the account details of principal officers of the National Assembly and the Judiciary. Such reports are not true,
“In line with its powers as provided in the NFIU Act 2018, the Unit already has access to details of all bank accounts in the country and does not therefore, need to write to commercial banks asking for the same information.
“As a matter of fact, relevant reporting entities such as investigative and other Law Enforcement Agencies always rely on the NFIU for information on bank details of individuals and body corporate under investigation as they go about carrying out their functions. Such is a mandatory reporting process.
“The Unit does not also make blanket requests to all banks as is being speculated in the reports
“The media and indeed the general public are therefore, requested to disregard such reports.”
