Banking Career

Pattison is a respected professional with over 27 years of banking experience and more than 14 years of extensive experience in anti-money laundering and counter terrorist financing, regulatory compliance, internal controls and audit.

Prior to his current position at Access Bank, he worked for thirteen years at Citibank Nigeria covering internal control, internal audit, operations and financial control.

Before devoting himself to the world of compliance and the fight against financial crimes, Pattison started off at an accounting firm; All-well Brown & Co. Chartered Accountants in Portharcourt, where he worked as the Audit Supervisor. Here, he was tasked with the auditing of corporate bodies in the public and private sector. He also performed other duties such as; tax consultancy, advisory services, secretariat services, accounting services, also including mergers and acquisition services.

Driven with youthful passion and a desire to impact more organisations, he left the accounting firm and his services were acquired by Rivers State Univ. SCI. & Tech. P. Rivers State, this time not as a student but as an internal auditor in charge of the institution's business units. His time here was a fruitful one as he was able to complete special audits of all income yielding ventures in less than one month. It is important to note that these audits were overdue for the past two years before Pattison joined.

One would have expected him to sit on his laurels, not Pattison. He immediately got another job at the National Provident Fund. As a Senior Internal Auditor, he was responsible for pre and post audit of Benefits payments and the internal controls of the PH offices. He remained here for a while before moving to Citibank Nigeria in Port harcourt.

He was the bank’s operations assistant/executive officer charged with Internal controls clearing and fund transfer/ payments. Pattison excelled in that position and was promoted to Assistant Manager Services Management Group, Head (Back Up) and Counter Services Head of the bank. With an already well established accounting background, Pattison had no problem handling the cash and teller services, customer services desk general internal services funds transfer, trades services, payments and internal controls. As a cash officer, he designed a tool for blocking funds offline for over-the-counter transactions during temporary system shutdown. This enabled the Counter Services to provide uninterrupted services even when the VSAT link was down. The system also improved productivity and turn-around time since funds were blocked using the PC; instead of flipping through huge pages of printed reports. This was during a prolonged leased line failure where he was able to resolve various system differences amounting to millions of Naira.

These achievements did not go unnoticed as he was immediately transferred to Citibank's Lagos office to resume as the Financial Control Officer of the branch. He was in-charge of preparing regulatory reports to the Central Bank of Nigeria and the bank’s financial statements monthly and for publication. He also managed local taxes and liaison with all statutory and regulatory audit processes. During his time at Citibank, Pattison pioneered the preparation of the financial statement of the bank for publication (hitherto prepared by the external auditors). Layered by his years of experience and in-built resilience, Pattison won a Quality Dividend Award for his ability to cope under severe stressful situations arising from six months of combining his job with that of two other colleagues who left the bank.

Pattison maintained a rapid and sustainable growth at Citibank and became the Manager/ Finance Head. Assuming this position, he performed regulatory reporting for the United States and was responsible for all offshore regulatory reporting to the parent office. With all his accomplishments at Citibank, Pattison felt it was time to take on a new challenge for the advancement of his career.

He joined Access bank as the Group Head, Systems and Controls where he also served as Assistant General Manager and Chief Inspector in charge of Audit, Investigations and Quality Assurance, while providing quarterly reports to the Board Audit committee. Pattison was not just there to be a spectator, he led the Internal Control Merger subcommittee during the bank’s merger with former Capital and Marina Banks in 2005 in what has been acclaimed to be one of the fastest and best mergers in Nigeria during the Bank Consolidation exercise in Nigeria. While winning the Best Cost Centre Award in Access Bank in 2006 and also wrote a Paper on Fraud Prevention and Detection for Publication in the FITC compendium of writings. Pattison was the Chairman of the committee that set up the Forensic Accounting program of ICAN Faculty of Audit and Investigations. He served as the coordinator of the Team of Auditors managing the Secretariat of the Presidential Committee on the Verification and Reconciliation of Fuel Subsidy Payments in Nigeria Chaired by the GMD/CEO of Access Bank Plc Mr. Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede.

Due to his impact, Access Bank was also nominated twice as one of the three banks for the FATF mutual evaluation exercise which led to the eventual delisting of Nigeria from the FATF list of Non Cooperative Countries and Territories in 2006. More than his role as Chief Inspector in charge of audit, Pattison represented Access Bank in the Bankers’ Committee Sub- committee on Ethics and professionalism in 2004 and was reappointed to serve another term based on his valued contributions during the investigative panel sessions.

Still under the systems and control unit, he was appointed in 2006 as the Deputy General Manager and Chief Compliance Officer; monitoring Regulatory and Anti-money laundering (AML) compliance, internal controls including Information Technology Security and controls, Corporate Governance and reporting to the Board Audit committee and the Board Risk Committee. Pattison also became the Chairman of the Committee of Chief Inspectors of Banks in Nigeria sub-committee on Emerging Issues and member of the Security Sub-committee which led to the automation of the caution letter project. As a member of the Banker’s committee subcommittee on Security, he was appointed into a team that sourced and bought 26 Armoured Personnel Carriers for the Nigerian Police from South Africa. In 2007, he made a presentation on behalf of Access Bank to the Egmont group of FIUs as part of the efforts leading to the admission of the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit to this group. To also demonstrate his leadership skills, fourteen of his staff qualified as CAMS under his tutelage.

In 2009, Pattison was made the Head, Group Compliance and Internal Control for Access Bank Plc. He served as General Manager and Chief Compliance Officer; monitoring regulatory and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) compliance, internal controls including information technology security and controls. He also performed the role of corporate governance and reporting to the Board Audit committee and the Board Risk Committee. He is also an outstanding contributor to Anti-Money Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism regime in Nigeria particularly for being one of the pioneers that brought the ACAMS to Nigeria being the first Chapter outside Europe and America.

At this point Pattison’s experience and undoubted abilities pushed him to become the Head, Group Chief Conduct & Compliance Officer (CCCO) for Access Bank Plc. This position, which he currently occupies, gave him the authority to monitor regulatory intelligence, financial crime, IT/e-business compliance, transaction & threshold, trade & treasury compliance, health safety security and environment compliance and compliance and ethics advisory services whilst reporting to the Board Risk Committee and Board Audit committee. He is an advocate of controls and compliance and a significant influencer leading to the formation of the Committee of Chief Compliance Officer of Banks in Nigeria (CCCOBIN) and the Compliance Institute, Nigeria. The CCCOBIN was established ten years ago through the solo efforts of Pattison working as head of Compliance in Access Bank Plc with the objective of creating a level playing field for banks in Nigeria in the fight against Money laundering and terrorist financing. This effort contributed to the removal of the country from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) Non-cooperative countries list in 2006 and the grey list in 2013.

He is the current President of the Compliance Institute of Nigeria and also a member of many professional bodies including the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria, Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria, Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria, Information Systems Audit and Control Association and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners. He is certified in anti-money laundering and risk management assurance. Pattison represents Access Bank Plc in the International Banking Security Association based in the U.S.A and the U.N Global Compact on Anti-Corruption Working Group. He is also a member of the AML working Group of Institute of International Finance U.K.

In 2015, Pattison won ACFE Nigeria Chapter award for contribution in the fight against Fraud and White Collar Crime. He also attained the ACAMS Nigeria Chapter's recognition as an outstanding contributor to Anti-Money Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism regime in Nigeria. The Convention on Business Integrity (CBi) award was also accorded to him in appreciation of exemplary leadership and valuable contributions as a member of the Executive of the Core Group of the CBi. He got the Lagos State Audit Service Commission award in appreciation of invaluable service to the Auditors in the Lagos State Public Service.