The Cabinet has remained convinced that South Africa will in the next five months address the remaining 14 greylisting anti-money laundering deficiencies required by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to get the country out of the greylist.
Acting Minister in the Presidency, Maropene Ramokgopa, yesterday said Cabinet received the fourth progress report by the Interdepartmental Committee on Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (IDC-AML/CFT) since South Africa was grey-listed in February 2023.
The progress report gives effect to the Cabinet decision of September last year that the IDC-AML/CFT reports progress three times a year.
Ramokgopa said there has been significant progress for South Africa to address technical compliance deficiencies and of the 20 technical compliance requirements, 15 have been fully addressed.
“For South Africa to completely exit the greylisting had 22 actions identified as deficiencies on effectiveness, of which 8 of these items have been fully addressed, leaving 14 items to be addressed by February 2025,” Ramokgopa said.
“The Cabinet takes notes of complexities of the nature of issues to be addressed, but remains committed to ensuring that efforts are heightened to address the remaining actions, and also takes note that South Africa’s efforts are yielding better outcomes compared to the well-developed countries like the United States of America, which is still heading behind South Africa.”
Asked whether this would be sufficient time for the government to deal with the remaining deficiencies considering that there were a number of industries that were showing reluctant compliance, Ramokgopa said they will definitely meet the deadline.
“We are planning on ensuring that we do meet the agenda that we have put for ourselves,” Ramokgopa said.
“So we don’t foresee us not being able to meet what we have put on for ourselves, precisely because the progress that we have already been able to register is actually proof that we are going to be able to meet what we have set for ourselves.”
In July, the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) warned that certain designated non-financial businesses and professions (DNFBPs) were continuing to ignore its directives aimed at helping South Africa exit the grey list of the FATF.
These institutions now face targeted inspections or targeted sanctions for their non-compliance.
The FIC said estate agents, lawyers, trust services and company services providers had been tardy in their more than a year late submissions, and this is standing in the way of South Africa exiting the grey list of the international FATF.
The FIC had asked these businesses to submit answered questionnaires in March last year, with a May 31, 2023 due date.
Dealers in precious stones, in precious metals, credit providers and crypto asset service providers were also asked to submit their questionnaires by July 31, 2023, and these were also still outstanding.
“There appears to be wilful non-compliance by businesses in these sectors, despite repeated calls and appeals for them to complete and submit their long outstanding (questionnaires) to the FIC,” Christopher Malan, executive manager for compliance and prevention at the FIC, said.
.BUSINESS REPORT