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“419” SHADES OF GREED AND CRIMINAL DECEPTION
419 Scams originated in the early 1980s from Nigeria as their oil-based economy declined. Several unemployed university students first used this scam as a means of manipulating business visitors interested in shady deals in the Nigerian oil and payment sector within its procurement before targeting businessmen in the west, and later the wider global shylock population hungry for a piece of the African dream of easy riches. Opulence demonstrated by their friends and nationals working or doing business in Africa the land of milk and honey saturated with god given minerals asset of over 23 of the 33 precious minerals.
With hindsight looking into the mirrors of the past, Africa was invaded and exploited because of its vast minerals deposits i.e. South Africa by the Dutch and British, Congo by the Belgians and French, Ghana and Sierra Leone by the British. All in the name of mineral assets including gold, diamonds, copper, iron ore, oil, coltan and titanium paying very little or next to virtually pittance for its extraction. These very vital minerals has contributed to wars, misery, slavery, violation of human rights and other indignation to the African people than the development, benefits, happiness and hope expected. This was then scamming in the early century going by its definition in today’s jargon.
Scammers in the early-to-mid 1990s targeted companies, sending scam messages via letter, fax, or Telex. The Internet has helped transform a local form of fraud into one of Africa’s biggest problem which has contaminated every sector even its political, local, security and the executive arm of governance falling victim in one hand and becoming facilitators on the other by its agents and system collaborating with perpetrators in most cases because of saboteur, greed, domestic problems and the like. The spread of email and easy access to email and low cost of sending scam letters through the Internet and to wider recipients aided and facilitated by ICT globalisation village effect, has spiral from locations in Africa to Asia and Eastern Europe.
An advance fee fraud is a confidence trick in which the target is persuaded to advance relatively small sums of money in the hope of realizing a much larger gain. An example was the scenario in Ghana, in which a company offered a 1 billion dollar loan to the government for a minimum fee of mobilisation cost for a project. It was proven by the investigative branch of the government at the end to be bogus and the company address as stated in the documents presented to the ministry of finance was an address in the UK belonging to a hair dressing shop. As far back 1992 when the NPRC government took over through a coup detat, the young head of state then in Africa (26yrs of age) Capt. Valentine E Strasser was flown out of Sierra Leone in a private jet by a diamond magnet to Belgium with a very large consignment of diamonds to the tune of millions of dollars for which little was realised by himself Strasser, the people of Sierra Leone or government then. There are many variations on this type of scam to governments and leadership in Africa examples very evident in the history of leaders like Mobutu of Zaire now DRC, Abacha of Nigeria and many others who deposited large sums of money into international bank accounts which has only benefited the banks and their syndicates using different breeds of approaches.
Today many African governments is experiencing its own perspective of 419 and its effect on the economy in its evolution. This development is not new and did not start only yesterday. It has been a canker in other governments manifesting in different shapes and forms within the economical structure of the country. It is like a virus that germinates in the wickest parts of ones physiological and corporeal faculty. "Crave for easy wealth breeds in this analogy the vices of society; decay and greed within the economy are the culprits turning a nation into an animal kingdom".
419 scams starts with a letter e-mail sent to many target recipients making an offer that will ultimately result in a large payoff for the intended victim. The stories behind the offers vary, but the standard plot is that a person or government entity is in possession of a large amount of money, oil quotas, diamonds or gold. This person, for myriad reasons, either cannot access the wealth directly or is no longer in need of it. Such people, who are either real but impersonated people or fictional characters played by the scammer, could include the wife of a deposed African leader or top officials, a dictator, a terminally ill wealthy person, a wealthy foreigner who had deposited money in the bank just before dying in a plane crash leaving no will or known next of kin, a U.S. soldier who has stumbled upon a hidden cache of gold in Iraq, a business being audited by the government, a disgruntled worker or corrupt government official who has embezzled funds, a refugee and similar characters.
The money could be in the form of gold bullion, gold dust, money in a bank account, diamonds, a series of cheque's or bank drafts, and so forth. The sums involved are usually in the millions of dollars, and the investor is promised a large share, often forty percent or more, if they will assist the scam character in retrieving the money from holding and/or dispense of it. The proposed deal is often presented as a harmless white-collar crime, in order to dissuade participants from later contacting the authorities. Whilst most recipients do not respond to these emails, scammers are able to gain victims through sheer greed. Victims who attempt to check the background of the offer will often find that all pieces fit perfectly into place. Such scammers can often lure wealthy investors, investment groups, or other business entities into scams resulting in multi-million dollar losses. However, many scammers are part of less organized gangs or are operating independently; such scammers have reduced access to the above connections and thus have little success with wealthier investors or business entities, but are still convincing to middle-class individuals and small businesses, and can exploit and milk hundreds of thousands of dollars from such victims.
A 419 scammer will introduce a delay or monetary hurdle that prevents the deal from occurring as planned, such as "in order to transmit the money, we need to bribe a government or bank official. Could you help us with some money or a loan?" or "In order for you to be allowed to be a party to the transaction, you need to have holdings at a local bank of $50,000 or more" or similar. More delays and more additional costs are added, always keeping the promise of an imminent large transfer alive, convincing the victim that the money they are currently paying will be covered several times over by the payoff. Sometimes psychological pressure is added by claiming that the other side, in order to pay certain fees, had to sell all belongings and borrow money on their house pointing out the different salary scale and living conditions in Africa compared to the West. Much of the time, the needed psychological pressure is self-applied; once the victims have put money in toward the payoff, they feel they have a vested interest in seeing the "deal" through. Some victims of greed intentions believe that they can cheat the 419 scammer.
The essential fact in all advance fee fraud operations is that the promised money transfer never happens because the money or gold does not exist or if it does, it is fake. The perpetrators rely on the fact that, by the time the victim realizes this (often only after being confronted by a third party who has noticed the transactions or conversation and recognized the scam), the victim may have sent thousands of dollars of their own money, and sometimes thousands or millions more that has been borrowed or stolen to the scammer via an untraceable and/or irreversible means such as wire transfers or banks with collaborators in connection with the deal. The spam e-mails perpetrating these scams are often sent from Internet cafés equipped with satellite Internet very difficult to trace its IP address. Recipient addresses and email content are copied and pasted into a web mail interface using a standalone storage medium such as a memory card. Many African countries Internet providers (ISP's) contain many shady cyber cafés that serve scammers. During the courses of many schemes, scammers ask victims to supply bank account information.
Usually this is bait devised by the scammer to gauge the victim's gullibility. Scammers often request that payments be made using a wire transfer service like Western Union and Money gram. The reason given by the scammer will usually relate to the speed at which the payment can be received and processed allowing quick release of the supposed payoff. The real reason is that wire transfers and similar methods of payment are irreversible, untraceable and because identification beyond knowledge of the details of the transaction is often not required, completely anonymous. Telephone numbers used by scammers tend to come from mobile phones. A scammer may purchase an inexpensive mobile phone and a pre-paid SIM card without submitting subscriber information. If the 419 scammers believed they are being traced, they throw their mobile phones into wastebaskets and purchase new mobile phones. Some crime syndicates in Africa employ the services of fraudsters in Europe, Asia and the United States who conclude deals for them or threaten victims who try to leave deals. It has become a double edge sword.
Removing political formalities and bottle necks will invite more business investments making things flexible, transparent and easier for government to concentrate on local issues exonerating it from negative actions and stigmas caused by fly by night businessmen.
Its must empower trade and business citizens both local and in the Diaspora of international experience, clout and recognition knowledge base in their activities to work with embassies in the trade and business sectors, setting standards, gathering information of potential business investors, scrutinizing and building dossier for onward transmission to the various areas of governance before arrival to the country of the so called investors for meetings and dialogue with government officials arm with the information about their supposed client businessman investor.
Must categories and classified investors by their status verified, areas of interests and capitalisation so that they can enjoy privileges and benefits as an incentive for their potentiality of wanting to do business in the country observing all legitimate and proper channels and conduit of doing business in Africa.
Genuine businessmen will go through intelligence reports available on the Internet or check source proposal on country of interest which is not a secret in today’s ICT globalise open information society before starting negotiations or transactions in any capacity or business dealings for the fear of compromising integrity. Those who become victims are aware of the risk they are taking by the red flag and alerts given by Embassies and other organizations warning visitors and businessmen and women to various countries about 419 scammers. This is the main reason embassies do not intervene in such situation in fear of embarrassments with their hosts. Who is victim or beneficiary in 419 scamming? , the one who is aware of his actions wanting to buy gold costing today over a 1000 dollars an ounce for $200 outside the government controlled GGDO?, diamonds at rock bottom prices out witting the royalties and taxation regime, or $250.000.00 invested to gain a so called deposit of 1 billion of late Gen Sani Abacha`s hidden booty? Countries in West Africa with red flag and warnings cited by state department country reports are found in yahoo and Google include Nigeria, Ghana, Benin, Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Togo, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Countries outside of West Africa with 419 warnings cited include South Africa, Spain, and The Netherlands. Growing at rapid rate is the Asia continent with China and India becoming notorious.
Who is guilty of an offence and under which crime to be prosecuted, when the funds brought into the country by so called victims are not deposited or declared through the normal business proposed channels or central banks according to regulations, and if so, source of the income declared because of the quantum amounts usually involved from the so called victims cases are tantamount to scrutiny for money laundering by existing standards and benchmark for doing business globally.
Is this episode scamming on the African side? And money laundering on the victim’s side? Two wrongs do not make anybody right. I am not holding brief for anyone here but merely playing the devils advocate and let’s call a spade a spade and what is good for the gander is good for the geese. This awareness will help stop illegal transactions involving or bringing countries image into disrepute by so called greedy and shylock businessmen roaming, invading and exploiting African economies to its detriments because of the greed of a few so called businessmen and women from bigger economies. Give unto Ceaser what is Ceaser and unto the Lord what is the Lord’s- But who is Ceaser and who is the Lord here in a 419 scenario?!!!!!!!
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