Following OFAC Correspondence
The We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) party is urging commercial banks to restore the accounts of its candidates after receiving clarification from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
This appeal comes in light of sanctions imposed in 2024 against Azruddin Mohamed, the party’s presidential candidate, along with Nazar Mohamed and Government Permanent Secretary Mae Thomas.
In a recent communication to WIN’s attorneys, OFAC clarified that the implications of transacting with a political party led by a sanctioned individual depend on whether that individual is involved in the transaction. They emphasized that U.S. financial institutions would not violate sanctions simply by maintaining accounts for or processing transactions involving non-sanctioned members of the organization.
The correspondence also highlighted that transactions with sanctioned individuals are generally prohibited unless exempted by a specific license from OFAC. However, non-sanctioned members of WIN are not subject to these restrictions, provided the sanctioned individual does not have an interest in the accounts or transactions.
Hana Mohamed, a member of the WIN party, expressed on social media that the recent OFAC guidance underscores that sanctions against Azruddin Mohamed do not extend to other party officials. She characterized the account closures as “political victimization” rather than compliance with U.S. law, asserting that banks acted unlawfully by targeting non-sanctioned candidates.
In the past month, at least three commercial banks have closed accounts belonging to individuals listed as candidates for WIN. Affected candidates reported being informed by at least one bank that these closures were linked to internal policies, citing the 2024 sanctions against Azruddin Mohamed.
The WIN party is now calling for immediate action from financial institutions to rectify what they view as unjust account closures, urging banks to align their practices with OFAC’s official guidance.
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