Government is in the process of establishing a Centre for Combating Illicit Financial Flows advancing efforts to combat financial crime including; money laundering and financing terrorism and proliferation.
Government says the move is an effort to avoid another grey-listing by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). This follows the removal of Botswana in October 2021 from the list of countries with strategic Anti-Money Laundering, Combating the Financing of Terrorism and Proliferation deficiencies.
“The center will assist Botswana’s compliance with the Anti-Money Laundering, Combating the Financing of Terrorism and Proliferation international standards by providing requisite training to all stakeholders,” the Finance Minister, Peggy Serame has revealed.
Serame told parliament on Monday that the center will be instrumental in building capacity in preparation for the next Mutual Evaluation, which is a peer review used to assess countries’ level of compliance with the anti-money laundering standard by the FATF. The evaluation is expected in January 2027.
To ensure compliance with the Anti-Money Laundering/Counter Financing of Terrorism International Standards, she indicated that Botswana conducted the National Risk Assessment completed in December 2023, which aimed to understand, identify and mitigate the risks associated with money laundering and terrorism financing.
“The assessment revealed that Botswana needs to strengthen her strategies to reduce both the Money Laundering Risks and the Terrorist Financing risks, rated medium-high and medium, respectively. Following these findings, an action plan is being developed with implementation during the 2024/2025 financial year,” Serame said.
Commenting on corruption in the budget speech, the minister pointed out that corruption remains a threat to Botswana’s economy, highlighting that in the International Corruption Transparency Index report 2023, Botswana was ranked at a score of 5.9, placing the country in the 39 position out of 180 countries.
“This compares to a score of 6.0 in 2022, which ranked Botswana 35 out of 180 countries. For this to change, a collective effort by all Batswana is required to fight all incidences of corruption, including tightening our procurement processes,” Serame emphasized.
The FATF, a global money laundering and terrorist financing watchdog greylisted Botswana in October 2018 accusing it of shortcomings in its financial regulation. It subsequently removed it in October 2021 following the country’s improvement of its anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing regulations.
