Bank Negara Malaysia governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz said that they will be making a public address on illicit fund outflow ‘soon'.

Though the probe has been going on for close to two months now, she said that the central bank will have to go through the numbers thoroughly first before making any statement.

NONE "We have spent some time looking at the numbers and making an assessment on the various areas but this is not something we are addressing just now," said Zeti ( left ).

"As far as the early 2000s we put in place the Anti-Money Laundering legislation, one of the strongest legislations in the region. Then we also have the Money Business Services Act, to be tabled in Parliament in the first half of this year.

"All this will enable us to address these issues, and we now have introduced measures on moneychangers, making it compulsory for anyone taking money in and out to make a declaration," she told reporters after a special annual briefing to the prime minister over the country's financial outlook for this year.

However, she was mum when asked when she would be releasing the statement. Instead, she merely said that the investigation process had to be ‘extensive'.

"We want to be sure of the numbers and that's why it's taking time. The balance of payment numbers is very extensive and we have to look at everything. We have to see if they are correct, if they can be validated, and this is what we will highlight in the statement," she said.

Illegal mone y hub

The Washington-based group Global Financial Integrity (GFI) had in their latest report , detailed that Malaysia had become a hub of illicit financial outflows (money leaving the country through illegal means).

The report released in January, ranked Malaysia fifth in the world, in terms of illicit financial outflow for the year 2008.

The report said that such outflows have more than tripled since 2000 to RM208 billion in 2008, with bribery, theft, kickbacks and tax evasion as some of the causes.

In a related development, Deputy Finance Minister Donald Lim told reporters at the Parliament lobby that action had been taken against 68 currency exchange operators in relations to the GFI report.

He said that the licences of 50 operators have been suspended, whereas 10 had their licences revoked. Another eight operators were charged in court.

“Bank Negara has launched an investigation and has determined that the illicit outflow of funds was executed through currency exchangers,” he said.

He added that the action taken by Bank Negara over the period of 2000 to 2009.