The Director of the Solomon Islands Financial Intelligence Unit (SIFIU) Mr. Jimmy Sendersley says currently the Solomon Islands does not have any specific law that can deal with pyramid schemes.
Mr. Sendersley highlighted this at a press conference on the topic of illegal operation by one of the schemes in the country known as the One Link Pacifica.
He said though there are no specific lines on that in our legislation, under the Financial Institution Act 1998, One Link’s operation has already been seen as illegal and requires immediate action.
He added currently, the SIFIU and the Central Bank of Solomon Islands (CBSI) are carrying out an investigation on the illegal operation and find an avenue to address the issue.
“As it is illegal, we and the CBSI have to reach some kind of good level where we are comfortable before we actually take some kind of action,” he said.
He said since there’s no legislation guiding the schemes, they are also working on further steps to take the matter to the legislative level.
“Our management has already taken the issues seriously and we have to sit down together with the government and work on it,” he said.
Sendersley said so far the Solomon Islands already have a good number of schemes operating in the country and that is the reason legislation on that is required.
He said some of the current schemes they are aware of include the one in Auki known as the Eagles Fund, another one is the Infrastructure Fund gathered and collect funds down at the children Park area and of course the One Link Pacifica.
“We also have some kinds of multi marketing level schemes where their system works the same as pyramid schemes where their products might be good but the system applied is just a pyramid,” he said.
He added despite many of the pyramid schemes already operated in the country over the past years, the current One Link scheme is one of the most that triggered their office after many complaints were received.
By IAN M.KAUKUI
