E-Financial
ICIJ Fingers Western Union, MoneyGram as Conduits to Launder Criminal Cash
International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) has uncovered how companies like Western Union and MoneyGram play a hidden role in laundering cash from around the globe.
In May, the International Criminal Court ruled that Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo, former vice president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, will not be compensated for spending more than a decade in detention on war crimes and other charges mostly overturned on appeal.
He will not be reunited with his planes, villas and river cruiser, nor will he receive the $77 million he asked for in compensation.
After 12 years and more than 100 witnesses, history now records just one judgment of guilt: that Bemba bribed witnesses using Western Union and MoneyGram International, the world’s largest money transmitters.
Bemba and his allies, the court found, offered soldiers and civilians $100 or more — and in some cases relocation to Europe — to lie in Bemba’s trial.
In 2002 and 2003, Bemba commanded 1,500 Congolese soldiers who intervened in a conflict in the neighboring Central African Republic.
His forces killed civilians and raped women and girls as young as 10, victims and other witnesses later claimed.
The ICC found Bemba guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity and witness tampering in 2016. The first two charges were overturned on appeal in 2018.
The bribery conviction held up.
A leak of U.S. government banking records reveals new details about the alleged payoffs — and the role Western Union played in them.
Bemba and four aides, also convicted of bribing witnesses, sent more than $429,000 through Western Union from 2005 to 2015, according to a suspicious activity report submitted by Western Union to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a division of the U.S. Treasury Department. It is unclear how much of this money was used for bribes.
The suspicious activity report cites hundreds of recipients in 23 countries and names three people who have not been identified before, including one of Bemba’s key allies, Narcisse Arido, who received nearly $30,000 through Western Union, according to the report.
The Western Union report is also notable for its timing.
Financial institutions are required to regularly examine transactions and accounts for signs of money laundering and other types of financial crime.
Western Union didn’t file the suspicious activity report, or SAR, describing the payments until 2015 or later — at least seven years after Bemba’s arrest.
The undated Western Union document is one of more than 2,600 records obtained by BuzzFeed News and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists as part of the FinCEN Files investigation.
The reporting team found that banks, money transmitters like Western Union and other financial institutions have moved vast amounts of money for people accused of corruption and other crimes, often long after allegations were first made public
Bemba’s money flows are among suspicious transfers worth at least $150 million that went through Western Union and MoneyGram between 2005 and 2017, according to an ICIJ analysis of transactions from the FinCEN Files.
The two companies filed or were cited by other financial institutions in 236 suspicious activity reports, according to ICIJ’s analysis. Suspicious activity reports reflect the views of banking professionals and are not themselves evidence of criminality.
Payments through money transmitters, while often small, are central to modern crime. The FBI counts such payments as the third most common method to launder money, after bank transactions and payments in hard cash.
Recent cases in which money transmitters allegedly played a central role include several involving opioid trafficking rings and the crime rampage of a violent Eurasian mobster.
“Certain money transfer companies have repeatedly demonstrated a readiness to provide essential support to criminals and terrorists,” said David Pressman, an attorney suing Western Union, MoneyGram and two Russian banks on behalf of families of victims killed by Ukrainian separatists who shot down Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 in 2014.
“The business model is predicated on moving cash fast, at a global scale, even when it means moving cash to those intent on carrying out murderous acts.”
Big guys and little guys
The amount of money that Western Union, MoneyGram and other money transmitters send worldwide in a year exceeds the gross domestic product of Switzerland or Saudi Arabia. More than $689 billion was sent in 2018, the last year for which figures are available.
While remittances — especially transfers to relatives — are a crucial source of income for many people, especially in poorer countries, crime agencies say drug and human traffickers, fraudsters and arms smugglers push money around the world through the same companies.
The Financial Action Task Force, an international network of government anti-money-laundering agencies, found that many criminals avoid banks because they see money transmitters “as offering less risk of detection.”
Money transmitters are hard to monitor; there are 23,968 companies in the United States alone that fall under the technical term “money service business.” They are based at post offices, banks, liquor stores, Walmarts and gas stations. They range from behemoths like Western Union to a three-person outfit in Pago Pago, American Samoa.
Like banks, American money transmitters must report suspicious activities to FinCEN, the U.S. agency that oversees the fight against financial crime. Yet officials acknowledge that they catch little of the illicit money that passes through money transmitters.
Criminal exploitation of money transmitters is one of the “most significant vulnerabilities” in the United States, according to the Treasury Department’s 2020 report on the national strategy to counter illicit finance. There are simply not enough auditors to monitor the industry, the strategy paper said.
In the vast money transmission sector, the FBI calls MoneyGram and Western Union the “Big Guys.”
The big guys have a big rap sheet.
In 2012, the U.S. Justice Department agreed not to prosecute Dallas-based MoneyGram, the world’s second-largest money transmitter, after its agents conspired with fraudsters to trick victims into sending money with false promises of lottery winnings and bargains.
“MoneyGram Agents knowingly entered false addresses, telephone numbers, and personal identification” and took fees for processing the frauds, the company admitted in a statement of facts filed in federal court.
To escape prosecution, MoneyGram agreed to create a system to spot and stop potential frauds, tie executive bonuses to compliance with the law and require every MoneyGram office worldwide to follow U.S. anti-money-laundering rules, among other conditions.
MoneyGram broke the agreement when its new anti-fraud system failed to prevent a substantial number of criminal transactions, according to the Justice Department. MoneyGram paid a $125 million penalty.
Citing MoneyGram’s “environment of fraud,” the Justice Department in 2014 took the unusual step of suing a senior executive. It accused the company’s chief compliance officer, Thomas Haider, of allowing criminals to use MoneyGram “to defraud innocent consumers and then launder the proceeds.” Haider settled and paid $250,000.
Western Union, headquartered in Colorado, operates in more than half a million locations worldwide, compared with MoneyGram’s more than 350,000 outlets.
In 2010, the company agreed to upgrade its anti-money-laundering systems and paid $94 million to settle charges that drug, human and weapons smugglers misused the company to move vast sums of money across the U.S.-Mexico border.
Seven years later, Western Union agreed to pay $586 million after a U.S. investigation found that the company enabled scammers to defraud hundreds of thousands of Americans who paid to claim prizes or job offers that didn’t exist. “Various Western Union agents were complicit in these fraud schemes, often processing the fraud payments in return for a cut of the fraud proceeds,” the Justice Department said in a news release.
A year later, New York state fined the company $60 million for, among other things, waving through cash for criminals in China. And in 2019, French officials fined the company for failing to alert regulators to suspicious customers in Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey.
Western Union told ICIJ that it would respond to questions. It never did; the company’s communications chief, Claire Treacy, did not return subsequent emails or phone calls.
MoneyGram proposed a phone conversation with ICIJ to “potentially help” with research. MoneyGram canceled the call and sent a written response in which the company declared that it had found “several statements to be completely baseless.” The company did not explain what it considered “baseless.”
“MoneyGram takes financial crime very seriously and does not tolerate unethical or illegal conduct,” the company said in a statement. MoneyGram “has invested tens of millions of dollars in our state-of-the-art compliance program” and “has among the lowest fraud rates in the industry,” it said.
‘Exploitation’
Jean-Pierre Bemba’s detention in 2008 made global headlines after police in Brussels arrested him and the ICC asked African and European capitals to seize villas, cars, bank accounts and a Boeing 727-100.
The ICC, which was created to bring the world’s worst war criminals to justice, whisked Bemba to The Hague, where his trial opened in November 2010. He was charged with witness tampering three years later.
“Whiskey” was Bemba’s code name for Western Union and “Mike” for MoneyGram, according to wiretaps obtained by ICC prosecutors. “Never, never, never” should payments pass through a bank account, Bemba told one aide.
Bemba conspired with aides – all of whom were also convicted, including his defense lawyer and a member of the DRC parliament – to coach witnesses to pretend that they were soldiers and testify in Bemba’s favor.
During his trial, prosecutors alleged that Narcisse Arido, an expert witness for Bemba’s defense, lured Central African witnesses with the hope of asylum in Europe and “exploited the precarious personal situations of these witnesses, selling them the illusion that by testifying falsely for Bemba they would have a better future.”
Sometime after Oct. 12, 2015, Western Union filed a suspicious activity report to FinCEN saying an employee had “identified” news about Bemba on the ICC’s website. Western Union reported almost 2,000 transfers from 2005 to Oct. 12, 2015, that involved Bemba and accomplices.
Arido, for example, received $28,732 from 30 Western Union branches in seven countries, according to the suspicious activity report. The ICC had issued a warrant for Arido’s arrest at least a year and 10 months before Western Union submitted its report to FinCEN.
The Western Union report indicates that Arido sent payments to three people in Cameroon and France: Arlette Josiane Tongui Bengue, Louis Kotys and Sylvie Ngo Manding. The average transaction was worth less than $300. It is unclear whether the payments were part of the bribery scheme.
Kotys and Ngo Manding could not be reached. Tongui Bengue, who now lives in Quebec, refused to answer questions when contacted.
You don’t need Western Union or banks to “go around and threaten a witness with a monkey wrench,” said Robert Cryer, a law professor at the University of Birmingham in England. “But money is central to other forms of witness intimidation.”
In a WhatsApp call with ICIJ, Bemba denied bribing witnesses. “No, that is absolutely false,” Bemba said. “I was not in a position to do it.” He has appealed the rejection of his compensation request.
From drug dealers to the godfather
From bustling metropolises like Tokyo to the world’s smallest capital city, Ngerulmud in Palau, Western Union’s black and yellow logo or MoneyGram’s white arrow can be found almost everywhere. For a fee, the companies offer an easy way to wire money to a loved one in a panic or to seal a business deal on a deadline. They play an essential role in the lives of tens of millions of people who use their services, from vice presidents to journalists.
While a bank-to-bank transfer can take days, both companies claim to make cash available “within minutes.”
There’s no stopping all illicit money transfers, especially those involving small dollar amounts and people not known to law enforcement.
But financial institutions are supposed to be on the watch for people like Anthony Gomes and his cronies.
Gomes and others helped introduce the potent opioid fentanyl to the U.S., routing the drug from Chinese laboratories to American dealers and users through the postal system. More than 36,000 Americans died last year from overdoses of fentanyl and similar synthetic drugs.
His trafficking ring hid transactions through offshore accounts and wired money through Western Union, according to court documents.
The records show that he and others sent $17,600 to China in one month alone via the money remitter.
“I have the guy on the way to wu [Western Union] now give me a few,” Gomes emailed another dealer, according to court records. “Ok good stuff,” the fentanyl dealer replied. “New batch is even stronger than [the] last.”
At least four Americans, including 19-year-old Daniel Latjerman in North Dakota, were killed by fentanyl imported by Gomes’ ring, prosecutors said. Gomes pleaded guilty in 2018 to conspiracy charges related to drug trafficking and money laundering.
Gomes and eight others appear in a spreadsheet included with a suspicious activity report in connection with more than $403,000 in payments made via MoneyGram from 2012 to 2017. Also named in MoneyGram’s undated report was Darius Ghahary, a northern New Jersey man charged in 2014 with manslaughter after Latjerman died. Ghahary died in custody. It is unclear why MoneyGram filed the report when it did.
MoneyGram helped move money for Ghahary despite his well-publicized conviction for internet fraud more than a decade earlier.
Money transmitters are one of “two key payment systems which support illicit procurement of opioids,” the assistant director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement told Congress in 2018. Just a few months earlier, an undercover agent of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration told a federal court that he received fentanyl in a box marked “peanuts” after wiring $80 to China via MoneyGram.
Last year, the Treasury Department alerted financial institutions to the potential abuse of money transmitters in fentanyl and synthetic opioid trafficking.
The FinCEN Files show that one of America’s most dangerous Eurasian mafia dons built his empire with help from money transmitters.
In 2018, Razhden Shulaya, a Brooklyn tow-truck-leasing company manager, was convicted in New York of masterminding “a vast and violent criminal enterprise” involving gambling, credit card fraud, contraband cigarettes and stolen chocolates. Authorities said he also had plans to defraud casinos with rigged slot machines.
Shulaya was a “thief-in-law” the Russian equivalent of a godfather, U.S. prosecutors said. “He used his power to steal, defraud, extort and disfigure.” They cited occasions when Shulaya pistol-whipped his nephew and battered the face of a lieutenant after a perceived insult. Members of his gang beat enemies with pool cues. Others, to curry favor, gave Shulaya a Mercedes and a crossbow as gifts.
Shulaya is serving a 45-year prison sentence in West Virginia. He has appealed his conviction.
Two years before Shulaya’s conviction, FinCEN reported that an “associate” named George Meskhishvili sent $12,600 from Western Union locations in New York City to eight people, including Shulaya.
The agency’s report called Meskhishvili one of the possible “central facilitators” in the financial networks of Eurasian crime gangs. Meskhishvili has not been criminally charged.
FinCEN said the transactions were suspicious because many amounts were below the $10,000 threshold that banks must report in currency transactions, or were sent on the same or consecutive days.
In May 2014, Meskhishvili wired $1,200 from Brooklyn to Shulaya at the Bellagio hotel and casino in Las Vegas weeks before the U.S. launched its investigation. By the time Western Union approved Meskhishvili’s payment to Shulaya, the thief-in-law had previously been arrested in Europe during a high-profile anti-mafia crackdown. Shulaya was also wanted in Russia on unspecified charges, according to U.S. prosecutors.
ICIJ was unable to reach Meskhishvili for comment through social media or his last listed address in Brooklyn.
Asked five times why it approved payments to Shulaya, Western Union never replied.
When people and businesses gain genuine access to financial services, they gain the ability to transact securely, build savings, and access credit. That access creates the conditions for progress: more stable revenues, better business decisions, and the capacity to grow. Progress, sustained over time, is what produces financial happiness. This framework is how Moniepoint measures its impact.
According to Moniepoint 2025 Impact Report, titled creating financial happiness; “Financial happiness is the feeling of confidence and ease that comes with financial freedom and well-being. It is a condition that develops over time and requires a specific set of enablers to take hold.
For millions of people and businesses across Nigeria, those enablers, like tools and solutions to manage their finances, have historically been out of reach. Moniepoint was built to change that, and this change, for us, begins with inclusion”.
Across the world, access to digital tools is a key driver of financial inclusion. The World Bank’s Global Findex 2025 report finds that more than 60% of adults in low- and middle income economies now make or receive digital payments. In Nigeria, this figure is around 54%. Moniepoint has been a key driver in expanding this access with its POS terminals. “Our terminals also drive financial inclusion for individuals.
The report stated that, in 2025, Moniepoint enabled 100 million people to make payments via their POS terminals across the country. For customers in communities where bank branches are scarce or non-existent, a Moniepoint terminal at their local shop, market stall, or fuel station provides reliable access to digital financial services.
They can make purchases, withdraw cash, and manage their money without travelling long distances or depending solely on physical currency. Critically, customers without cards can complete transactions through direct bank transfers to the terminal’s account.
Beyond practical benefits, Moniepoint terminals have also introduced a new layer of trust to everyday commerce. “When network issues make it unclear if a payment went through, the Moniepoint terminal’s loud beep provides instant confirmation for everyone, building trust in digital payments with every transaction”.
Moniepoint POS terminals operate across all 774 local governments in Nigeria, ensuring that small sellers and large stores can accept payments reliably, regardless of location.
In 2025, millions of Nigerians, businesses and individuals alike, accessed Moniepoint services through its mobile app. Top among them are groups like women and low-income earners, who have historically been excluded from formal banking. Inclusion of women is particularly important, as they typically manage household spending and informal savings but are frequently left out of structured financial systems. “Through our app, they are gaining financial independence and greater control over their economic decisions,” the report added.
For millions of Nigerians, debit cards represent a move away from the limits of cash transactions. They enable safer, more reliable everyday payments, particularly as more local businesses begin to accept digital payments.
Moniepoint debit cards are designed to meet this need. In 2025, Moniepoint customers completed over 300 million card transactions at physical locations, largely driven by essential, food-related purchases. Most of this spending took place at neighbourhood provision shops where households buy everyday items such as rice, cooking oil, and soap.
“We’ve made access to our cards intentionally simple. Customers can get a Moniepoint debit card by requesting it within their mobile app or from neighbourhood agents, without lengthy paperwork or waiting periods. By lowering these barriers, more people are able to access financial tools and participate in the formal financial system.
“Our cards also safeguard our customers’ financial information. They don’t carry special markings or any identifiers that could expose our customers or put their financial security at risk. In the event of loss, this reduces the likelihood of targeted fraud or misuse.
“When people can pay with their debit cards at their neighbourhood stores, they can manage their spending, reduce cash handling, and transact more securely. Merchants also benefit, recording higher transaction volumes and more consistent customer activity.
“Moniepoint helps millions of businesses and individuals across Nigeria access seamless payments and banking, every day. The widespread adoption of our tools and services, as highlighted, demonstrates our critical role in expanding financial access, supporting everyday commerce, and enabling more Nigerians to participate safely and consistently in the digital economy,” the report noted.
ChatPay has launched Africa’s conversational banking platform, enabling individuals and businesses to access financial services through WhatsApp.
The Lagos-based fintech startup, is in controlled rollout, connecting WhatsApp to linked-bank management, airtime and supported electricity payments through simple conversations.
The company said the platform is designed to enable users to send money, pay bills, buy airtime and manage business transactions within WhatsApp conversations, subject to the completion of regulatory approvals and integration with licensed banking partners.
According to ChatPay, the platform is operated by CP Technology Limited and is currently undergoing a phased rollout ahead of its planned public launch.
The company said the initiative is intended to simplify access to financial services by leveraging WhatsApp, which it estimates is used by more than 50 million Nigerians monthly.
Speaking on the idea behind the platform, Adeoluwasubomi Odebunmi, product lead and co-founder, said the concept emerged while she was studying Software Engineering at Babcock University.
“I saw the gap while I was still in school—how much friction there was just to move money. I didn’t want to just study the problem. I wanted to help fix it,” she said.
Odebunmi said she had previously worked on software solutions spanning e-commerce, real estate management, school administration and artificial intelligence applications before co-founding ChatPay.
Aseoluwa Siyanbola, growth lead and co-founder, said his experience managing Nigerian bank accounts while studying abroad highlighted some of the challenges users face with digital banking services.
According to him, difficulties such as one-time password (OTP) failures and inconsistent banking applications inspired the team to explore conversational banking solutions.
“We each encountered similar challenges and came together to build a solution that simplifies everyday financial transactions,” he said.
cAbraham William, tech lead and co-founder, said the company is focused on improving access to financial services through a platform that many Nigerians already use daily.
“We want to make financial services easier to access by allowing people to carry out transactions through a familiar messaging platform,” he said.
William said he oversees the company’s engineering, technology strategy and system architecture.
ChatPay said its services will be introduced in phases as regulatory requirements are met and integrations with banking partners are completed.
The company added that its newly launched “Founding 2,500” programme will enable selected early users to test features, provide feedback and participate in product development before the platform’s wider rollout.
According to the company, interested users can register for the waitlist and the Founding 2,500 programme through its website.
Founded by Odebunmi, Siyanbola and William, ChatPay said its long-term goal is to expand conversational banking services beyond Nigeria into other African markets after its domestic rollout.
United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc has been named Nigeria’s Best Bank for Retail Banking and Best Bank for Sustainability Leadership (ESG) at the 2026 Euromoney Awards for Excellence, reinforcing its position as one of Africa’s leading financial institutions.
The awards were presented on July 17 at The Peninsula London in the United Kingdom, recognising financial institutions that have demonstrated outstanding performance, innovation, customer impact and sustainable banking practices.
The double recognition highlights UBA’s growing influence in retail banking and its commitment to advancing environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles across its operations.
According to Euromoney, UBA distinguished itself through a series of sustainability initiatives, including the introduction of a Green Financing Facility designed to support households and businesses transitioning to renewable energy.
The publication also cited the bank’s ₦5 billion financing programme, implemented in partnership with the Bank of Industry (BOI), to provide funding for women-owned businesses.
Euromoney further recognised UBA’s commitment to achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, describing it as a demonstration of the bank’s long-term sustainability strategy.
The publication also highlighted the bank’s efforts to integrate sustainability into its operations through the deployment of solar-powered energy solutions across 50 branches and comprehensive ESG capacity-building programmes that have trained more than 16,000 employees across the UBA Group.
In the retail banking category, Euromoney noted that UBA continued to consolidate its position as one of Africa’s largest retail banking institutions.
According to the publication, the bank expanded its customer base to more than 37 million by the end of 2025, while retail banking revenue increased more than fourfold to ₦429.5 billion.
The awards also recognised UBA’s continued investment in digital banking innovation, particularly enhancements to its artificial intelligence-powered chatbot, LEO.
Euromoney noted that LEO became Africa’s first AI-powered banking platform to facilitate cross-border money transfers in local currencies through the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS).
Commenting on the awards, UBA’s Group Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Mr Oliver Alawuba, described the recognition as a validation of the bank’s commitment to delivering value to customers while promoting sustainable development across Africa.
“To be recognised as Nigeria’s Best Bank for both ESG and Retail Banking in the same year sends a powerful message that sustainable banking and commercial success are mutually reinforcing.
“At UBA, we are committed to financing Africa’s future, supporting businesses and communities, promoting financial inclusion, and delivering innovative banking solutions that improve lives.
“These awards belong to our customers for their confidence in us and to every member of the UBA family whose dedication continues to make our vision a reality,” he said.
Also speaking, UBA’s Group Head, Marketing, Brand and Corporate Communications, Mrs Alero Ladipo, said the awards reflected the bank’s unwavering commitment to putting customers at the centre of its operations.
According to her, every innovation, investment and banking solution introduced by UBA is aimed at creating exceptional value for customers while expanding access to financial services.
“These awards are a powerful affirmation of our Customer First philosophy.
“Whether it is supporting entrepreneurs with access to finance, enabling seamless digital payments, advancing clean energy financing or expanding financial inclusion across Africa, UBA remains focused on delivering meaningful impact.
“We are honoured that one of the world’s most respected financial publications has recognised these efforts,” she said.
UBA currently operates in 20 African countries, as well as the United Kingdom, United States, France and the United Arab Emirates, serving more than 45 million customers through a combination of digital banking platforms and physical branch networks.
The bank said it remains committed to strengthening financial inclusion, driving innovation and supporting sustainable economic development across Africa and beyond.
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