The Malawi Law Society (MLS) has urged those responsible for bringing perpetrators of the theft of public funds, dubbed cashgate, to also investigate the role banks played in the plunder.<\/p>\n
MLS president, John Suzi Banda, made the call during the society\u2019s annual conference held on Friday in Mangochi.<\/p>\n
The focus of this year\u2019s conference was on the financial sector.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn regulation of commercial banks, I hope we can explore the role of these financial institutions in public finance management. I have time and again stated that the role that financial institutions played in facilitating the massive looting of public funds christened \u2018Cashgate\u2019 require further investigation by the authorities,\u201d said Banda, adding:<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere collusion or criminal negligence is discovered, charges ought to be quickly and mercilessly brought against those officers of the financial institutions that are suspected of having fallen short of their obligations under the Money Laundering, Proceeds of Serious Crime and Terrorist Financing Act.\u201d<\/p>\n
Banda wondered why millions of kwacha were cashed through the banking system when those who cash lesser amounts are subjected to strict procedures.<\/p>\n
He asked the authorities not to play double standards on the issue saying in much the same way as partners of law firms\u2014 which are classified as financial institutions under the Money Laundering, Proceeds of Serious Crime and Terrorist Financing Act\u2014 willingly disclose the amount of funds that have passed through their trust accounts, banks needed to be subjected to the same levels of scrutiny in relation to Cashgate.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne would hope that this same standard, if not higher, was going to be applied to financial institutions proper through whose accounts billions of our scare resources passed through.<\/p>\n
\u201cLadies and gentlemen, let us for a moment pause here and ask how people were allowed to cash money in hundreds of millions of kwacha before a teller when I have to wait for a good part of an hour if not more for triple verification to cash a K500,000 cheque,\u201d queried Banda.<\/p>\n
He added:<\/p>\n
\u201cWere the tellers not suspicious? Were the branch managers not suspicious? What about the internal audit? What about the central bank? What was its role? The looting of our hard earned tax was too systematic and organised to be the work of a few greedy individuals,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He, however, said his sentiments are not meant to put \u201cundue\u201d pressure on the investigating, prosecuting and regulatory authorities.<\/p>\n
In response, Bankers Association of Malawi (Bam) president, Misheck Esau, said MLS has a right to express its opinion.<\/p>\n
Esau added that as far as Bam was concerned, its members followed measures put in place in the banking sector and were not in the wrong.<\/p>\n
\u201cBanks and, indeed, other financial institutions pay the highest compliance costs compared to any other sector in this country. Bam\u2019s position is that its members have put in place measures and systems to comply with laws and regulation at all times.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is, therefore, our strong belief that our members dealt with their client accounts in compliance with the minimum levels of compliance required of banks even in the case of government accounts that were involved in this evil act of cashgate,\u201d<\/p>\n
Esau said.<\/p>\n
He, however, asked those with incriminating evidence against banks to report to relevant authorities for the law to take its course.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving said the above, we observe that the country is ruled by law. In the event that some bank, or bank employee, flouted any laws and regulations in conduct of accounts that were involved in Cashgate, then the law will take its course at the time and hour that those responsible for these cases will determine and decide to take legal action.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo far we believe state agencies are doing a good job. It is not the agitation against banks by the law society or anyone that will get our members in trouble with the law. Perhaps, it is whether there was wrong doing by banks that could [get our members in trouble],\u201d said Esau<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Malawi Law Society (MLS) has urged those responsible for bringing perpetrators of the theft of public funds, dubbed cashgate, to also investigate the role banks played in the plunder. MLS president, John Suzi Banda, made the call during the society\u2019s annual conference held on Friday in Mangochi. The focus of this year\u2019s conference was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":19809,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19806"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19810,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19806\/revisions\/19810"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}