Government's revenue authority plans to hire an international accounting firm to dig out information about the money siphoned of the country, as reports say billions of funds flew abroad.
"We are considering signing a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the firm so that it could collect information related to money laundering from the country," National Board of Revenue (NBR) Chairman Md Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan said Sunday.
He came up with the disclosure at a ceremony where the NBR signed an MoU with the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit of Bangladesh Bank for spy- work against money laundering as part of the drive.
The memorandum of understanding is specifically on information sharing and international cooperation to prevent money laundering and illicit financial outflows from the country.
The signing took place at the NBR office in Dhaka. Bangladesh Bank executive director, also deputy head of BFIU, Mijanur Rahman Joaddar and NBR member (board administration) SM Ashfaq Hussain signed the deal on behalf of respective sides.
BB deputy governor, also head of BFIU, Abu Hena Mohd. Razee Hassan, NBR members and other high officials were present at the programme.
Speaking at the function, the chairman said the NBR is taking a lot of initiatives to prevent money laundering. A deal with an accounting firm is one of them.
He wouldn't name the name of the firm before entering into a pact with it. The firm has experiences garnered through working in the field in other countries and has presence in Bangladesh, too, he said.
Replying to a question on the Global Financial Integrity's figure of capital flight from Bangladesh, Mr. Mosharraf said the amount was not always authentic.
Different government agencies, including the Anti-Corruption Commission, the NBR and the BIFU, are working for detecting and bringing back the illicitly drained-out money, he said, adding that the firm may also find out the information.
The Washington-based GFI in its report in 2017 estimated that some $61.6 billion was drained out from Bangladesh during 2005-2014.
The Money Laundering Prevention (amendment) Act 2015 empowers the revenue board to investigate money-laundering issues related to taxes.
In the situation, the NBR signed the MoU with the BFIU on information sharing to prevent illicit financial outflows and terrorism financing as the central bank's agency has cooperation agreement with financial intelligence agencies of 56 countries.
BFIU has also taken initiative to sign such agreements with some other local agencies, including the ACC and Bangladesh Police, to build up a synergy for an effective combat in this field.
According to the MoU, director-general of the central intelligence cell of the NBR and a general manager of the BFIU will act as focal-point officer and there will be some primary contact persons to work on the issue.
The NBR chairman said the revenue board will share information on money laundering with the BFIU whenever it gets from any source so that the BFIU can prevent outflows of foreign currencies from the country.
On the other hand, BFIU will share related information, particularly on trade-based money laundering, when it will get from local or global sources with the NBR to prevent the offence by unscrupulous persons.
The MoU will work as a deterrent in prevention of money laundering as unscrupulous ones will refrain from such activities for fear of getting caught by the intelligence agency, he said.
Razee Hassan said the agreement will make the country compliant with the condition of global agency like Asia-Pacific Group on Money Laundering on having effective mechanism for prevention of illicit financial outflows.
He also said currently the ACC was dealing with 32 cases related to the offences and succeeded in bringing back laundered money in one case.
Regarding the figure of capital flight from the country disclosed by different global agencies, he said BFIU found that only 7.0 per cent of total deposit in the Swiss banks went from personal accounts while the remaining 93 per cent deposit went through banking channel.
But, it was interpreted that the total amount revealed by the Swiss banks was laundered from the country, he said. "We always remain vigilant, but we don't take the figure as it is," he added.
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