Faris to Senators: Stop ignoring me

ATTORNEY GENERAL Faris Al-Rawi implored Senators to pay attention to him today as he piloted a bill to amend the Proceeds of Crime, Anti-Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Unit Acts.

“I’m literally finding it hard to find a focal point in the Senate today," he confessed, "because everybody seems so busy I feel I’m talking to myself, quite frankly.

“But let me proceed. I’m searching for one face, and I mean that genuinely.”

Several senators giggled.

“I thank Senators for making themselves available so graciously,” the AG said.

Also thanking Parliament staff, he invited Senators to visit the fifth floor to meet the people who run Parliament’s business.

Of the nuts and bolts of the bill, the AG explained the agencies that were exempt from reporting suspicious transactions. Insurance agents need not report, as an insurance policy has a very low risk of being used for such ends. The Unit Trust is already supervised by the Central Bank, and it would be superfluous to ask the National Insurance Board (NIB) to report, he said.

The AG said the bill extends the class of people banned from tipping off a suspect that his suspicious transaction is being reported to the authorities. The ban will be not just on leaks by the police and Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), but also by those such as a disaffected law clerk secretly telling a suspect that her law firm is about to report his transaction.

Al-Rawi said how hard it was to debate the related issue of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a global treaty against money laundering.

“This world of the FATF is filled with anachronisms. It is filled with obligations and inconsistencies. You’re fighting civil law versus common law.”

He said one must learn many abbreviations in speaking about technical things as fast as you can.

“When you get to the FATF world you have to know what an FSRB is, ICRG is, PDG is, WIGFI is. The terminology alone is a lexicon in itself.”

In conclusion, he said the country has worked diligently and earned praise from its assessors.

“We’re on the right track. Our international obligations and complying with them is not trading our sovereignty.

“I’m sure we all agree that following the money, stamping out corruption, moving money laundering, improving our courts, making sure the financing of terrorism doesn’t happen – we all agree those are local goals we must ascribe to and apply to ourselves.”