{"id":64550,"date":"2025-04-21T20:06:42","date_gmt":"2025-04-21T20:06:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=64550"},"modified":"2025-04-21T20:06:42","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T20:06:42","slug":"scuml-certificate-not-a-license-efcc-clarifies-amid-cbex-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/04\/21\/scuml-certificate-not-a-license-efcc-clarifies-amid-cbex-scandal\/","title":{"rendered":"SCUML Certificate Not a License, EFCC Clarifies Amid CBEX Scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Adenike Lawal<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has debunked claims suggesting that a SCUML certificate serves as a license or clearance for business operations, following growing confusion linked to the controversial CBEX investment scheme.<\/p>\n<p>In a statement released on its official X platform, the anti-graft agency clarified that CBEX was never registered with the Special Control Unit Against Money Laundering (SCUML).<\/p>\n<p>Instead, a different entity, ST Technologies, obtained the certificate\u2014misleading many into believing CBEX was duly authorized.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSCUML registration is a statutory requirement, not a business license or EFCC clearance,\u201d the Commission emphasized, pointing to Section 17 of the Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act of 2022.<\/p>\n<p>The clarification comes after victims of the CBEX Ponzi scheme, including Lesley Kessy Oviritsa, said they were lured in by the platform\u2019s Corporate Affairs Commission documents and SCUML certificate.<\/p>\n<p>CBEX had also claimed a Securities and Exchange Commission license was forthcoming by May 2025, adding to its air of legitimacy.<\/p>\n<p>The EFCC stressed that its role is to investigate and prosecute financial crimes, not to authorize business operations.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not a clearing house for online ventures,\u201d the statement said, but assured that action is being taken to secure justice for victims.<\/p>\n<p>CBEX is under investigation for allegedly defrauding investors of over N1.3 trillion.<\/p>\n<p>Law enforcement agencies, including INTERPOL, are tracking the masterminds behind what is fast becoming one of Nigeria\u2019s largest financial scams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Adenike Lawal The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has debunked claims suggesting that a SCUML certificate serves as a license or clearance for business operations, following growing confusion linked to the controversial CBEX investment scheme. In a statement released on its official X platform, the anti-graft agency clarified that CBEX was never registered [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":64551,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173,172],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-64550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-news","tag-featured"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64550","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64550"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64550\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64552,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64550\/revisions\/64552"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}