While the Movement for Social Justice agrees that the 100 dollar note needed to be changed, political leader David Abdulah said it seems as if the Government is figuring out the process as it goes along.
“That sounds very much like the Petrotrin saga, where they made a decision and then tried to figure out what to do after.”
Speaking yesterday at the Bankers Insurance and General Workers Union (BIGWU) headquarters in Barataria, Abdulah said there are large sums of counterfeit money out there and cash garnered from money laundering, the way the Government is handling the process leaves much to be desired.
“Information coming out in drips and dribbles does not help public confidence. The Central Bank should have met with other financial institutions prior to the announcement so that the rollout could be done in a way where the banks would have properly prepared to handle more customers, the Financial Intelligence Unit ought to have been well prepped so that all suspicious transactions could be acted on and investigated.”
But the Minister of Finance said he did not alert the banks beforehand because that would have been a national security risk. However, Abdulah said that is very worrying.
“If the Minister of Finance said that it, therefore, says that the leaders of this country’s banks are security risks, that is the logical implication of his statement and if he’s saying that, that then creates a crisis of confidence of the ordinary citizen in the banking system.”
And while the MSJ said they agree with the initiative to change the 100 dollar bill, it would not have stopped there.
“We would remove the Financial Intelligence Unit from being a unit within the Ministry of Finance to be a stand-alone body with statutory powers of investigation because at this point in time all the FIU could do is collect reports of suspicious transactions and then pass it on to the Financial Intelligence Bureau, we certainly would have appointed special prosecutors to deal with white-collar crime.”
The MSJ has already given a firm commitment that it will be contesting the next General Elections.
Abdulah said the results from this year’s Local Government Elections is heartening and he said his party has the political will to tackle money laundering.
“We are not financed by those engaged in illegal activities whereas the other parties they have cocoa in the sun.”