Sunday, November 4, 2012
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/manila/local-news/2012/11/04/house-panel-okays-changes-anti-money-laundering-law-251571
A BILL seeking to strengthen the country’s fight against criminal money will soon be endorsed for plenary debate at the House of Representatives.
Recently approved by the House committee on banks and financial intermediaries was House Bill 6565, which aims to change sections 10 and 11 of Republic Act 10167, signed by President Benigno Aquino III only this year.
If passed, the measure will now classify as crime the conversion, transfer, disposition, movement, acquisition, possession, use, concealment or disguise of money sourced from illegal activities.
Predicate offenses to money laundering will now also include human trafficking, sexual exploitation of children, corruption and bribery, forgery and environmental crime.
The bill likewise includes designated non-financial businesses and professions as reporting institutions such as casinos, real estate agents, dealers in precious metals, dealers in precious stones and trust company service providers. The list of financial institutions was also expanded.
It also grants the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) the authority to file civil forfeiture cases upon determination of probable cause and impose administrative sanctions.
Further, the measure allows the AMLC to retain 25 percent of net proceeds of forfeited assets.
Last month, the Senate failed to pass final amendments to the anti-money laundering law as Senator Teofisto Guingona III, the bill’s main sponsor, warned of possible backlash through stiffer rules in processing remittances of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
The Philippines was earlier upgraded from the dark grey list of global regulator Financial Action Task Force (FATF) after both houses of Congress passed in June two AMLA measures, listing terrorist financing as a predicate crime and allowing authorities to freeze suspected bank accounts without a court order.
Senate Bill 3123, however, became controversial since it proposes tax evasion as predicate crime, which Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile feared may be used for political harassment. (Virgil Lopez/Sunnex)