African Tink-Tanks Head To Senegal To Discuss Stricter Regulations On Illicit Financial Flows, Asset Recovery In Extractive Industry

African think-tanks are meeting in Senegal in the first ever Global Conference of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), an event that will be dominated by discussion on stricter rules and penalties for people who launder proceeds from the oil and gas sector and other extractive Ventures in the continent.

The event which will host top level participants like the African Union (AU) High-Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows (AU HLP on IFF) and the Working Group on the Common African Position on Asset Recovery (CAPAR) which is composed of the African Union, the Coalition for Dialogue on Africa (CoDA), Forum Civil, the Pan-African Lawyers Union (PALU) and TrustAfrica will take place in Senegal.

The theme for the 2023 event is, “Addressing Illicit Financial Flows and Asset Recovery in the Extractive Industry”, scheduled for the 13th and 14th of June 2023.

African countries dominate the EITI’s fifty-seven member states which meet every three years but have never hosted the event.

“The conference is organized in line with African Union Decisions and Instruments adopted by African Heads of State and Government. These include the AU Special Declaration Assembly/AU/Decl.5 (XXIV) of January 2015, the Nouakchott Declaration on the African Anti-Corruption Year (June 2018) and the Common African Position on Asset Recovery (CAPAR) adopted by the AU Summit in February 2020.

“It brings together policymakers, regulators, civil society organizations, industry stakeholders and the media to foster dialogue and collaboration in promoting accountability and transparent management of oil, gas, and mineral resources, scale up efforts with national anti-corruption agencies in raising public awareness, tracing and recovery of assets illicitly acquired from Africa, through tax avoidance and criminal activities such as tax evasion, money laundering and corruption,” The organisers said in a statement sent to THE WHISTLER.

Among other things, participants would discuss the need for enhanced transparency and accountability, stricter regulations and increased international cooperation in the extractive industry.

“They will address the impact of illicit financial flows and the common occurrence of corruption in commodities trading. The meeting aims to remind the EITI of its role in promoting accountable and transparent management of oil, gas and mineral resources and identifying effective strategies to address the challenges faced by victim nations.

“Participants will reflect on how best to engage national authorities, the judiciary and the citizenry to hold the perpetrators and accomplices accountable,” it added.

CAPAR is a policy advocacy instrument with the objective of assisting AU Member States to trace, identify, repatriate and subsequently effectively manage their assets, including items of cultural heritage.

Asides this, CAPAR stands as a tool for Africa’s legal and technical framework in structuring the managing of the return of Africa’s stolen assets from the foreign jurisdictions in which they may be held into the rightful source countries.

“That is why it is imperative that Africa’s assets, including financial resources lost through illicit flows, be returned to finance the continent’s development agenda as underlined in the AU High Level Panel Report on Illicit Financial Flows, adopted by African Heads of State and Government in January 2015,” the organisers said.