Money Laundering: EU to remove Ghana from blacklist soon

Head of the EU delegation to Ghana, Diana Acconcia has hinted of plans by the European Union to delist Ghana from countries blacklisted for illicit financial inflows.

According to her, the EU is working around the clock to remove Ghana from the list of money laundering and terrorist financing states.

Speaking on Joy News’ PM Express Business Edition, Mrs Acconcia indicated that Ghana has up measures to deal with the issues raised by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

She added that the Union is now waiting for the FATF report or review to take further action on the issue.

“It’s just a matter of time as that the Financial Action Task Force officials should be in town soon for its final review, physically or a possible virtual review.

“They are ready to remove Ghana from the list and I hope they can come and do that very soon because the country has made a lot of progress,” she explained.

Background on EU’s action

The EU Commission said on 7th May 2020 that Ghana is among 12 countries that pose “significant threats” to the EU’s financial system, due to deficiencies in anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing strategy.

According to the EU, these weaknesses identified in these countries possess a serious risk to their financial system hence the action, based on recommendations from the Financial Action Task Force, the Union went ahead to put Ghana on the list.

Ghana’s Finance Ministry, later in the statement, described the action as surprising and unfortunate, especially when government claimed that they had already steps to address all the issues, identified by the financial action task force. The action came with some scrutiny for Banks in Ghana dealing with their counterparts in Europe.