Recasting multiagency JIT under UK model underway

Remodeling the stolen asset recovery (SAR) initiative through creating an entity under a legal framework is under active consideration to give the drive a nudge.

Under the latest move Bangladesh Bank (BB) considers replicating UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) model which has written several success stories in various countries.

The existing recovery move is going through four separate entities which are bound by their respective laws and regulations.

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU), Central Intelligence Cell (CIC) and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) are the four entities now part of Joint Investigation Team (JIT) assigned to the task of repatriating caches of cash and kind siphoned off the country.

The post-uprising interim government formed the JIT in October 2024 in a bid to bring back Bangladesh's looted assets that have been allegedly siphoned to destinations like the UK, the USA, Singapore, Dubai and many other countries allegedly by the close allies of the Hasina government.

Bangladesh lost an average of US$16 billion annually through money laundering during the Awami League's tenure from 2009 to 2023, according to the Economic White Paper Committee report submitted in December 2024 to the Chief Adviser.

The JIT has been formed focusing on 12 large tycoons on the list that includes deposed premier Sheikh Hasina and her family members, S Alam, Syfuzzaman Chowdhury, Beximco, NASSA, Summit, Jemcon, HMB Iqbal, Nabil, Basundhara, Sikder, Orion.

The combined unit is supposed to work together but here each one is accountable to their own bosses, says Bangladesh Bank Governor Dr Ahsan H Mansur.

"We have received recommendations from NCA that the JIT cannot work in this process. Its members must be accountable to JIT," he adds.

The British agency is also composed of representatives from various entities but when they work with the NCA, they are members of the NCA, he explains to underscore the urgency of the recast.

"Eventually, JIT will have to be upgraded to the NCA model," Dr Mansur told The Financial Express.

Talking to the FE writer, a senior official of the CIC has hailed the move to gear up the combined efforts as the NCA is seen as the best model on SAR.

Fahranul Goni Choudhury, adviser to the BB governor on SAR, says the move is still at a preliminary stage which may take at least six months to frame a strategy paper.

"I have sought the NCA's model which started its journey in 2006," he adds.

In a recent meeting, he mentions, the BB governor and others talked whether the JIT has been able to deliver optimum output in the existing process it is working in.

The central bank has an in-house expert from NCA who has supported SAR during the last six months, he adds.

"We will make a strategic paper and align this with Bangladesh's existing laws and regulations of law- enforcing agencies.

"If we can frame the strategy and hand over to the next government, they'll consider," he adds.

Insiders in the JIT have said they are a bit frustrated over slow progress of the move and interorganisational disagreements in recent days.

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