The Minister Delegate for the Budget, Mr. Ahmat Jidoud, chaired yesterday by videoconference the opening ceremony of the 33rd plenary meeting of the GIABA Technical Commission.

In his speech, he first recalled that the year 2020 is marked by a deep crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic that has shaken our economies. To this end, he mentioned that, according to the forecasts of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the month of April, the gross domestic product in real terms of ECOWAS should contract by 1.6%, against a growth rate of 3 .1% in 2019. To contain this pandemic, the States have implemented emergency programs including preventive measures, such as the closing of borders, as well as the suspension of national and international meetings. These necessary measures, he specifies, have prevented the organization of the sessions of the GIABA bodies which should be held in Niamey during the month of May 2020.

The Minister Delegate for the Budget noted that the GIABA Secretariat, anxious to resolutely pursue its mission assigned to it by the authorities of the ECOWAS region, has taken the initiative to exploit the opportunities offered by information technologies. and Communication, by organizing virtual meetings. According to him, these meetings enable the GIABA Secretariat to closely monitor activities in the fight against money laundering and the financing of terrorism within member States.

Ahmat Jidoud recalled that the fight against financial crime is one of the primary and permanent concerns of the international community, due to the negative impact that this phenomenon has on macroeconomic stability, particularly on the integrity and stability of institutions. finances as well as on good governance. He was to add that the ingenuity of these financial criminals requires ever-increasing vigilance to prevent them from taking advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic to invent new methods of laundering money and financing terrorism.

In addition, he indicated that Niger has decided to include its National Mechanism for the Fight against Money Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism in a dynamic of continuous improvement, in particular through the implementation of reforms allowing the adapt taking into account new techniques and trends in money laundering and terrorist financing resulting from regional and international research. The Minister Delegate for the Budget informed the audience of the entry of our country into the process of the second round of mutual evaluation of the Member States, the visit of which took place from January 13 to 29, 2020.

He also confided that the government attaches particular interest to this exercise, which resulted in the adoption this year of a series of reforms aimed at strengthening the National System, through heads which, for some, fill legal loopholes and, for the others, consolidate the prerogatives of the CENTIF and the National Committee for the Coordination of Actions relating to the fight against Money Laundering, the Financing of Terrorism and the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (CNCA-LB /FT).

"In this context of a permanent terrorist threat, I cannot end my remarks without stressing the importance of cooperation between our Member States in our common fight against financial crime, which has become cross-border", declared the Minister Delegate for the Budget before notifying that this necessarily involves pooling the efforts of the Member States and intensifying the exchange of information at the level of the Community area.