The EU Global Facility’s Key Expert on Beneficial Ownership Alexandre Taymans is in Pretoria, South Africa 🇿🇦, this week, to oversee a training on Beneficial Ownership.
Starting on Monday 30 January 2023, the visit was preceded by an online briefing session with senior management of the FIU, Central Bank, and other key stakeholders, which served to gather background information and better assess the desired outcomes and areas of focus for the January mission.
Today, strategic discussions began at the FIU offices, gathering all members of the BO inter departmental committee (BO IDC) in South Africa, namely the Financial Intelligence Center, the Reserve Bank of South Africa, the Companies And Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC), the prosecution services, the law enforcement services, and tax authorities, among others.
Topics covered during the first three days will include:
- – BO transparency international standards and practices
- – Strategic and operational challenges and solutions
- – The role of BO register in the setting-up of an effective BO Operating Model
On the fourth day, participants shall be divided into smaller groups to review the application of BO transparency and relevant challenges in their specific domain, through sessions tailored respectively to SAMLIT members and law enforcement on one hand and to the BO IDC members on the other.
These sessions will consist of real-life case studies in order to 1) promote debate amongst participants 2) address the actual issues that participant face and; 3) provide pragmatic proposals to address them.
Sessions on BO register implementation and management will go through the implementation life cycle of a BO register and discuss the steps that South Africa should take to anticipate the planning and implementation of South Africa’s centralised BO register.
This project is funded by the European Union.