Treasury’s acting director-general leads SA delegation at Paris meeting
Treasury acting director-general Ismail Momoniat. Picture: TREVOR SAMSON
“I certainly have not given up and will fight to the fullest extent to prevent it. We are making significant and real progress,” he said in an interview after attending an FATF plenary session in Paris last week. He acknowledged, however, that avoiding the greylist would be “tough”. The FATF is an international body that sets standards to be adopted for the combating of money laundering and terrorism financing.
The SA delegation included representatives from the Reserve Bank, Treasury, Financial Intelligence Centre, National Prosecuting Authority, State Security Agency and Financial Sector Conduct Authority. While SA was not the focus of the meeting, Momoniat said the representatives of the government agencies were able to learn from their counterparts in other countries on the measures they had adopted to meet FATF standards. There was no indication yet of how the FATF would decide on greylisting SA, Momoniat said, but the government and its agencies were doing everything possible to avoid it.
Amendments to the Financial Intelligence Centre Act will expand the list of accountable institutions that have to report to the Financial Intelligence Centre. In addition, the Protection of Constitutional Democracy Against Terrorist and Related Activities Amendment Act deals specifically with the crime of terrorism.