A team from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) led by their Regional Director for West and Central Africa, Dr. Amado De Andres has paid a courtesy call on the Executive Director of the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) COP Maame Yaa Tiwaa Addo-Danquah and her management team.
The purpose of the meeting was to strengthen existing ties between the two institutions and to discuss program opportunities in the fight against money laundering, corruption and other organised crimes in Ghana.
The Executive Director noted in her opening remarks that EOCO has benefited immensely from the UNODC.
She added that the support had however dwindled post COVID until recently when EOCO benefited from a series of training in the area of Cyber Crime.
This was followed by the donation of some cutting-edge digital forensic equipment to boost the digital forensic capabilities of EOCO and some other law enforcement agencies in Ghana. She was therefore elated to have UNODC on board again.
Dr. Amado De Andre praised Ghana for being a champion for many reasons, which makes it easy for UNODC to want to continue to collaborate.
He added that the UNODC would also want to strengthen law enforcement institutions in Ghana in the area of asset recovery and help position the country to be a formidable force in the fight against illicit financial flows.
COP Maame Yaa Tiwaa informed the delegation of EOCO’s role as lead in the recovery and asset management charge for all law enforcement agencies in Ghana. She added that the UNODC could extend their support for EOCO, being a pioneering agency, in that area.
Mr. Cheikh Toure – UNODC Regional Law Enforcement Advisor and member of the delegation emphasized the importance of strengthening the confiscation, forfeiture, seizure and asset recovery regimes because criminals have found very creative means of hiding their ill-gotten wealth.
He also stressed the importance of introducing an integrated database of all law enforcement and partner institutions in Ghana to cover the gaps that the criminals take advantage of to ply their trade.
COP Maame Yaa Tiwaa Addo-Danquah concurred with Mr. Cheikh Toure adding that the ability to keep data of all suspects in a unified national database by law enforcement agencies would be very beneficial since it would make it easy to identify criminals who have engaged in further criminal activities and to notice emerging trends.
The meeting took place on 17th November, 2023.