Anti-Money Laundering Amendment Act signed
06 Jan 2023
The General Laws (Anti-Money Laundering and Combating Terrorism Financing) Amendment Act has been signed.
The presidency published the act in Government Gazette 47815 at the end of December 2022.
The act was first published in Gazette 47802 but was replaced.
Parliament gave the green light to the General Laws (Anti-Money Laundering and Combating Terrorism Financing) Amendment Bill and sent it to president Ramaphosa for assent earlier in December.
The national assembly passed the bill and sent it to the national council of provinces for concurrence in November 2022.
The bill was tabled in parliament in August 2022.
National treasury published the bill’s explanatory summary in Gazette 46744 earlier the same month.
Cabinet approved the bill in August for tabling in parliament.
According to the cabinet statement, the amendments respond to deficiencies identified during the peer review of the country conducted by the Financial Action Task Force.
“The mutual evaluation report made 40 recommendations that would assist in getting South Africa to be aligned with international measures of combating money laundering and financing of terrorism.”
South Africa was found to be lacking in 20 areas and the bill addresses about 14 of the areas identified.
The standing committee on finance adopted the bill with amendments.
The select committee on finance adopted the bill with no amendments.
The act seeks to amend a raft of acts including the Trust Property Control Act; Nonprofit Organisations Act; Financial Intelligence Centre Act; and Companies Act.
Proposed amendments to the Trust Property Control Act of 1988 include inserting definitions of ‘‘accountable institution’’ and ‘‘beneficial owner’’; imposing certain requirements on trustees; specifying matters that would disqualify a person from being appointed or continuing to act as a trustee; clarifying that a person who was appointed outside the Republic as trustee must be authorised by the Master to act as trustee; providing for the removal of a trustee who becomes disqualified to continue to act as a trustee; specifying information that must be kept by trustees in relation to beneficial owners in relation to trusts; requiring the Master to maintain a register containing information relating to beneficial ownership of trusts, and providing for access to information regarding beneficial ownership; and specifying certain offences.
Proposed amendments to the Financial Intelligence Centre Act of 2001 include amending the definitions of ‘‘beneficial owner’’, ‘‘domestic prominent influential person’’ and ‘‘foreign prominent public official’’, and inserting a definition of ‘‘prominent influential person’’; amending the objectives of the Financial Intelligence Centre (‘‘Centre’’); amending the functions of the Centre to include the provision of forensic information; empowering the Centre to request information held by other organs of state; providing for additional and ongoing due diligence measures, and amending the process followed when there are doubts about the veracity of information; aligning certain provisions and Schedules 3A and 3B to appropriately refer to domestic and foreign ‘‘politically exposed persons’’, as distinct from ‘‘politically influential persons’’, who will be dealt with in a new Schedule 3C; by amending certain provisions relating to resolutions of the Security Council of the United Nations; amending the powers of access by authorised representatives to records of accountable institutions; enabling the Centre to renew a direction not to proceed with a transaction; providing for the safeguarding of information; amending the provisions relating to the disclosure of information to the Centre and access to information by the Centre; empowering the Minister to prescribe appropriate requirements relating to the access to personal information to ensure that adequate safeguards are in place as required by section 6(1)(c) of the Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013; amending certain provisions relating to the risk management and compliance programme; amending the offences provisions to empower the imposition of an administrative sanction; amending the provision relating to the amendment by the Minister of Schedule 2; amending Schedules 2, 3A and 3B, and inserting a new Schedule 3C; and substituting the index for an arrangement of sections.
Proposed amendments to the Companies Act of 2008 include inserting definitions of ‘‘affected company’’ and ‘‘beneficial owner’’; providing for a comprehensive mechanism through which the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission can keep accurate and updated beneficial ownership information; requiring a company to keep a record of a natural person who owns or controls the company in terms of the definition of ‘‘beneficial owner’’, and providing for specified timelines within which the company must record any changes in this information; requiring a company to file a record of any natural person who owns or controls the company in terms the definition of ‘‘beneficial owner’’, with the Commission; and specifying that persons who are convicted of offences relating to money laundering, terrorist financing, or proliferation financing activities or are subject to a resolution of the UN Security Council are prohibited from registering as company directors.
In Gazette 47805, Proclamation 109 announced the commencement of the act.
Sections 9, 10, 16, 18 to 35, 59 and 62 to 65 came into effect on the date of publication.
Other sections come into effect on 1 April 2023.
See also:
- NA gives green light to Anti-Money Laundering Bill
- The high cost of FICA non-compliance
- The Companies Amendment Bill, 2021 for public comment
- Customer and banker relationship
