In May 2021, it was reported that a 21-year-old Dominic Ngene Joshua defrauded some investors over N2B using investment platforms. He asked his victims to invest in his companies, promising them that they would become shareholders in the company and get monthly returns on their investments.

We are still on the Chinmark case, the CEO Marksman Chinedu Ijeoma who is on the news to have (allegedly) defrauded his investors billions of Naira and he is still going about his daily business and now the recent (alleged) con-artist making the new who is (alleged) to have defrauded her investors over N500m is a 28 years old Imu Ovaioza Yunusa, who claimed to be an agricultural produce distributor.

Safe to say that if you want to get rich overnight in Nigeria don’t waste your time doing rituals or yahoo-yahoo or going into politics; just come up with an investment scheme and make up a “too good to be true” unrealistic return on investment/ profit margin for the prospective investors. Then, hire influencers to advertise and influence the investment platform for you.

Make sure you have an innocent look, appear to be rich, show off fake documents and wealth (after all nobody will verify or bother to check their authenticity), and sprinkle it with a dose of religion. Make sure you go around with cameramen to take quality pictures and videos for you to post on social media for your followers and prospective prey to see that you are doing well.

If you follow this process, believe me, that you are on your way to becoming an overnight billionaire; your prospective investors will gladly give you all their money without asking questions.

Marksman Chinedu played this game very well. He showed he is rich, always showing off unverified wealth on Facebook, then he added that he’s an empathic man and a philanthropist to his resume; he is always doing giveaways; he will always stop his convoy to give a random hawker on the street some bundles of cash.

He also showed he’s a religious man and a born-again believer too; he is always posting himself in church, praying, or in some religious gathering, then he came up with the (killer cliche) “all we have God gave us”. This swayed Nigerians into sending him their hard-earned money without verifying the genuineness of his person or his investment platforms.

Oviazo also played this game quite well too; she showed to be a philanthropist that runs a skill acquisition NGO, then she proved to know a lot about Agricultural products, then she was able to gather many followers on Facebook; although she didn’t add religion to her antics but she did add some sprinkle of emotional manipulations.

As for the 21 years old Joshua Ngene;  his antics and mode of operation will be a story for another day because I just can’t make sense of it. Some of his victims claimed that they had no idea what they were doing when they were investing in his investment scheme, that it seems they were under some spells or some unexplainable spiritual influence. 

Why people fall prey to these cheap frauds eludes my imagination. You fall for a cheap scam cooked up by a 21 years old who is still in secondary school learning in geography that “the earth is shaped like a ball”.

It’s all greed and “make money quick” syndrome that makes people fall prey.

Many Nigerians are gullible, greedy, and quick to believe everything and trust anyone. Quick to be carried away by what they see especially on social media platforms, quick to be swayed by social and peer pressure. The FOMO syndrome is a huge sickness in Nigeria and this is what these uneducated and backyard local fraudsters prey on.

“confido sed cognoscere” ( trust but verify). This popular statement is not for Nigerians. They trust blindly and are too lazy to verify or make some underground checks because if they do verify, some of the victims of this fraud wouldn’t have been a victim at all. 

I know in counseling and therapy, blaming the victim is not permitted but it should be said that in this regard the victims always play a huge role in them getting defrauded and that should be pointed out. 

If you really work hard for your money then you should verify, and carry out due diligence inquiry before you invest your millions of Naira into any investment scheme. 

The social media has been on standstill with the news of the Chrisland Schools pupil that was “gang-raped” by her classmates in Dubai during an international games competition that she and her classmates represented her school in.

As a side note, I have watched the video (the sex video of the little girl and her classmates which are boys, about 4 of them) and it does not seem to me to be rape, it clearly seems to be consensual group sex between the girl and the young boys but the boys made videos of the sex scene and posted it online unless there is something that I am missing. 

That being said, netizens should stop sharing, posting and distributing that video; posting, sharing and distribution of child porn is a crime in Nigeria and other countries of the world that would land you in jail.

This is the provision of s.23 of the cybercrime act, 2015;

S.23 (1) Any person who intentionally uses any computer system or network in or for- (a) producing child pornography;

(b) offering or making available child pornography;

(c) distributing or transmitting child pornography;

(d) procuring child pornography for oneself or for another person;

(e) possessing child pornography in a computer system or on a computer-data storage medium:

commits an offence under this Act and shall be liable on conviction –

(i) in the case of paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) to imprisonment for a term of 10 years or a fine of not more than N20,000,000.00 or to both fine and imprisonment.

Engaging in the production, distribution, and transmission of child pornographic content is a crime punishable with 10 years imprisonment or a fine of N20m or both the fine and the jail term.

Please desist from sharing that video for the sake of the little girl’s future and also  for the sake of public morals. 

As preparations towards the 2023 general elections in Nigeria are currently in top gear, there is reportedly anxiety among leaders of the two leading political parties in the country, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), over how their presidential flag-bearers for the polls ought to emerge.

Indeed, there are clear indications that the two parties would be bedeviled by renewed crises in the days ahead over their respective consensus arrangements.

While some chieftains of both parties have been rooting for the selection of the presidential candidates through consensus based on the agreement of a few leaders, which is allowed by the Electoral Act, a host of others see the option as undemocratic and another way of imposing the choice of a few members on others.

Though many of the stakeholders are particularly concerned about the presidential aspect, the various states are not left out, as there are equally attempts by the outgoing governors to determine their successors via consensus.

This is particularly the case in Ebonyi and Akwa Ibom states. In Akwa Ibom, PDP stalwarts are yet to buy into Governor Emmanuel Udom’s choice of Pastor Umoh Eno as his preferred successor. This was even as efforts by Governor David Umahi of Ebonyi State to broker a consensus agreement among governorship aspirants in the state chapter of the APC suffered setback within the week as the Izzi clan of Ebonyi North failed to shortlist two aspirants as demanded by the governor.

The present situation in Ebonyi is very similar to what is occurring among PDP presidential aspirants, where the zoning arrangements have generated crisis among the party stalwarts.

Accordingly, serious suspicion and misgivings have set in among the leading presidential aspirants and have put proponents of consensus arrangement on the defensive.

Indication to this effect emerged as prominent leaders of the party from the southern part of the country have expressed doubts about the real motives of the supporters of the consensus.

Former President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki; Governors Aminu Tambuwal (Sokoto), Bala Mohammed (Bauchi) and a former banker, Mohammed Hayatu-Deen, had last month initiated talks about the consensus arrangement in the PDP and have been moving round the country to woo members of the party to support the idea.

Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi told the facilitators of the consensus arrangement during their visit to Enugu State within the week that without adhering to the principles of equity, fairness and justice, the consensus arrangement would be a woeful failure. Similarly, Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State has vehemently kicked against the consensus arrangement.

Gov. Wike, who spoke during his recent visit to Cross River State to seek the support of party faithful for his presidential ambition, said: “Some people are moving for consensus. I am not part of that. If you want to run an election, come and run an election. When they came to me, I told them I am not a party to this one. What I don’t like in my life is deceiving people. What I will not do, I will not do. What I will do, I will do.

“If you can’t run again, say it out. Don’t hide under what you call consensus and come to me. Get on and run for the election. To be President of Nigeria is not by ‘dash’; you will sweat it out.”

It is reported that the fact that all the three aspirants who initiated the consensus talks in the PDP hail from the northern part of the country, was a key source of suspicion and rancour among the party high-ranking members.

It’s noteworthy that the new Electoral Act stipulates that for any consensus arrangement to be valid, all aspirants of the party involved must agree to it.

This implies that the leadership of the various prominent political parties in Nigeria must at the moment form a formidable coalition among their members as they prepare towards their respective primary elections.

They need to deploy a means to ensure that there is a tangible agreement among the overall aspirants as regards the consensus proposal, in accordance with the Electoral Act guidelines.

The time to do this is apparently short, hence all concerned must act very fast towards averting a more severe crisis that might lead the parties to a doomed state.