Director General of the Department of State Services, Yusuf Bichi, said terrorists have developed non-formal transactions to finance their activities.
According to The Nation, Bichi said this on Wednesday when he spoke at the closing of a two-day workshop on Terrorism Financing Risk for law enforcement agencies and judicial officers by the Service in Abuja.
He added that concentrating on banks and other formal transactions to track terrorism financing may not achieve anything tangible.
Bichi explained that kidnapping has become their major source of financing and they prefer to collect cash ransom in naira, adding that terrorists and bandits have aligned and now carry out operations in their hundreds.
He, however, said with the current zeal in the fight against terrorism and efforts to block terrorist financing, the security challenge would soon be a thing of the past.
“There is a new zeal among the security agencies to finish this war in the shortest possible time. Time is of the essence,” he said.
The DSS DG said the terrorists have resorted to smuggling, robberies, kidnapping, and gold mining to get money.
He said: “They engage in smuggling, instead of formal transactions. They buy goods from one country and sell in another. They engage in bank robberies.
“There lies the alliance between bandits and terrorists and that is why they have resorted to kidnapping.
“Kidnapping brings quick money to them. They demanded N100 million, N200 million and what have you.
“What do they request? Not bank cheques but cash. Not dollars but naira. Why they don’t want dollars is they are trying to avoid fake currencies.
“They know that if we are to give them our own currency it would take time before you produce millions of fake currencies. That is why they have the time to count.
“If there is one kobo shortage, they request for another person to come and rescue the man that came to give them the money.
“So you should be able to track their methods. They buy gold, they engage in gold mining.”
