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By Chika Abanobi
An investigation has shown that despite the boom and bust that characterised Ponzi schemes in Nigeria in the past, scammers have continued to try their luck. This reporter’s encounter with one of them early in the week opened his eyes to this fact. Experts contacted after the encounter gave tips on how to detect the scammers while the police urged victims to report immediately to law enforcement authorities.
The reporter’s ordeal began when he signed on to a group called Bitcoin Trading Investment which allegedly specialises in cryptocurrency and forex. Created on August 30, 2022, by one “Pastor” Williams, the group added the reporter’s name on January 6, 2023, probably sourcing the name from another WhatsApp group. That was how he was co-opted into its 134 “participants.” But that unauthorised addition of his name to the ghost list raised his curiosity and prompted him to play along in order to see what the group was up to. It promised mouth-watering income/profits to would-be subscribers. They included students, workers and businessmen and women. They promised to double within hours, and sometimes, days, whatever capital that was invested with them.
Red flags of a scammer
On Sunday, January 15, the reporter established contact with “Pastor” Williams to find out details of how the scheme works. He mesmerised the reporter with sweet talks about trading with Bitcoin cryptocurrency, with how people stood to make double of their capital investment within hours. He explained that that’s why his team and himself were on the ground to help would-be investors maximize profits on their investments after they (the group) had taken their own commission. His explanation sounded plausible and the reporter told him about his willingness to give it a try. Next, he sent the reporter a registration form where the new ‘customer’ was supposed to fill in his full name, phone number, account name, account number, bank name, occupation and amount being invested. It also included mode of payment – ATM transfer; POS transfer or Mobile transfer.
Under occupation, the reporter wrote “pastoring.” Since he claimed to be a “pastor,” he should understand, the reporter thought. Under the amount being invested, N30, 000 was written. This must have got “Pastor” Williams swooning as he called immediately to know when the new ‘customer’ would pay. He was told, Monday, since that was the start of the normal business week. He agreed. The reporter demanded an account to pay the money into, and the “pastor” sent in a personal account number. After protests by the reporter, the “pastor” explained that that “is what the business outfit uses for now.” After repeating that paying into a personal account looked suspicious and might affect the amount you were willing to part with, the “pastor” assured that any corporate money paid into the account was safe
But the first red flag came when none of the phone numbers listed on the WhatsApp group as “participants” seemed to work. The reporter placed a call to one of the alleged beneficiaries and a voice at the other end answered with a string of incomprehensible Hausa. The “beneficiary,” a female “participant” had given a testimony that affirmed the legitimacy of the business, although without stating how much she invested before she could receive N500, 000 profit as her margin profit. Two other numbers were called, and the response was “The called number does not have the facilities to receive calls. Please, call customers service for more information.” Two other numbers were called, but the response was: “the number that you are trying to call is not available. Call again later.” The pages of some of the participants looked suspicious. One of them named Jane, supposedly a woman, had a man’s photo as her DP. You raised the issue of the un-connecting calls with “Pastor” Williams and he dismissed it as a “network” problem. As you found out, most of the names were cloned from a WhatsApp group somewhere. Obviously out to tantalise prospective investors, one of them showed off a good picture of a brand new red car he just bought with his own profit.
As early as 6 am, on Monday, January 16, “Pastor” Williams started calling the reporter, who did not pick up initially. But after some time, the reporter picked and reprimanded the “pastor” for disturbing the family morning devotion. As a pastor he claimed to be, wasn’t he having devotion with his family, you asked with feigned anger. He claimed he was. Did he even have a family? He replied yes. Then, how many children did he have? He hesitated before answering: “almost three.” He was not, obviously, expecting the question. Why did he say “almost”, you probed further? Was his wife pregnant? He said no but seemed to be at a loss as to what explanation to give. But he nonetheless apologised profusely before adding that he was calling to know whether you had paid in the money. The reporter asked him when they opened for business. He said 9am. So why did he decide to call that early? Again he apologised and said the talk could continue another time.
Convincing evidence
By 8.32 am, you paid in the sum of N3, 000. Shortly after you did so, he called to protest. He said he was expecting N30, 000 from you, not N3, 000. You clarified that you initially had it in mind to pay that amount but later changed your mind, out of caution, after he gave you a personal bank account number, instead of a company or corporate one. He explained that the amount sent could not yield anything in Bitcoin trading. The reporter then asked him to send back the money. He laughed and said that it was not possible because the “admin” would use it to offset their running cost. He pleaded with the reporter to make the money N15, 000 to make it yield something, but he was told very clearly that that was impossible. Since then, several persons had been calling from the “company” with different phone numbers, describing themselves as “CEO” “admin officers”, “cashiers”, and so on.
One of them who gave his name as “Adebayo” used Mr. Tony Elumelu’s photo as his display photo. The problem with them was that they were all desperate to convince the reporter that they were involved in legitimate business. After sensing some hesitancy in the reporter, “Pastor,” Williams admonished: “As a fellow pastor, I want you to trust me that this is a genuine business; it is not MMM (moneymaking machine business). My pastor, I hope you have been reading the testimonies?”
Indeed, the reporter had read the ‘testimonies,’ none of which sounded convincing. Dr. Taofeek O. Dalamu and Dr. Anthony E. Anowu who did a language analysis of the testimonies faulted their lexical choices, poor sentence construction, incorrect use of tenses, use of Nigerian English and the solicitations as unbecoming of the language of corporate business outfit the company claims to be. The two, lecturers at the Department of Language and Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, Anchor University, Ayobo, Lagos, believe that the writers did not attend any tertiary institution and could only deceive their ilk or Nigerians bitten by the get-rich-quick bug.
Mrs. Margaret Olawoyin, an online trader and Mr. Olufemi Ajani, Chief Executive Officer, Crypto and Blockchain Academy, Diamond Estate, Isheri-Idimu, Lagos, also dismissed the promised doubling of one’s profit on capital investment. This is so because the cryptocurrency trading or market fluctuates. The promise to double one’s income makes it look as if the profit margin is always stable or accentuating. But this is not so. The idea of asking people to send money so that you can do it for them and double their profits within hours or days is totally anachronistic to crypto-currency business. Ajani explained thus: “It is possible to make profits within hours. But it is not like the way they are doing it. One can only be taught to do it by oneself, but not by collecting money from people to do it on their behalf. I don’t think anybody has interest in anybody as to front for him.”
Mrs. Olawoyin was worried that what the scammers were doing could undermine the confidence of prospective investors/subscribers to do business with genuine cryptocurrency investors/speculators. Lady Iyiego, CEO, Shalom Vineyard Initiative, said that many people had tried to co-opt her into the fake cryptocurrency business. But she said she scorned them because she does not believe in such get-rich-quick ventures. As far as she is concerned, she noted, they are not different from MMM that crippled many Nigerians financially and made them lose their money in the past.
Contacted, Benjamin Hudenyin, Superintendent of Police and Public Relations Officer, Lagos State Command, urged victims to report such cases to the command. He said: “We have in the past arrested culprits along that line. The problem is victims have not been reporting. Once the scammers are arrested, they are charged to court and prosecuted. There is provision for that in the law. If there is no victim’s testimony, there is no way we can initiate prosecution on anyone for fraud. But the best approach is to report to the nearest Divisional Police Officer who would now take it up.”
