Finally, the end came for a 3-man syndicate of fraudsters as one of them, Tijani Ladan, alias sulaiman recently bagged a six months jail term at the Lagos High Court, Ikeja presided over by Justice Wale Abiru. The convict is a member of a syndicate that allegedly duped a Turkish businessman of the sum of two hundred and fifty thousand United States Dollars ($250,000), through a phony scraped railway parts deal.
According to a press statement by EFCC's media and publicity unit, the other members of the syndicate are Ifeanyi Eze and Chief Uche Dimgba a.k.a Salami Kambo who allegedly masterminded the scam (still at large). Mr Yildirim Babadogan will never forget the day he met Ifeanyi Eze online, sometime in 2008. The source of his excitement was the piece of information he got from Eze to the effect that his company, Bulk Telecom Company deals in scrap railway parts. It was a line of business that fascinated the Turk who was looking for new investment frontiers.
After several discussions through emails and telephone, Mr Babadogan and his team finally came to Nigeria at the invitation of the con men. They arrived on 5th of July, 2008 and were lodged in a very expensive hotel at Ikeja. The next day, according to the complainant, they were taken by the suspects to the Rail Yard to inspect the products which they wanted to purchase. They were so convinced about the deal that it only took two days for a purchase contract to be signed between the parties. With the deal sealed, the victims returned to their country. They had barely arrived, when Chief Uche Dimgba a.k.a Salami Kambo who acted as the managing director of Bulk Telecom Company (BTC), started calling and threatening them that if they did not pay on time, he would call off the deal.
The threat paid off as the victim quickly sent the sum of Eighty Thousand US Dollars ($80,000) to Bulk Telecom Company in Nigeria. After they received the money, the fraudsters requested for more money with the explanation that they paid some to the Lagos State Government, for taking the 12 meters rails to the cutting area to cut to specification and containerized, ready for Customs inspection. With this false information, they got more money from the victim’s company.
Furthermore, suspect Dimgba a.k.a Salami, the self-styled Chief Executive of the fake company requested again for the sum of Sixty Nine Thousand US Dollars ($69,000) from Er-Polat Companies ostensibly as pay-off for the Central Bank of Nigeria to prepare their custom’s papers.
At this point the plaintiff became suspicious and on November 2, 2008 they returned to Nigeria to clear their doubts. As usual, they were well received and lodged into the same hotel they used four months earlier. Their first shock was Dimgba’s anger when they told him that they did not have the $69,000 that he requested for with them. Immediately he told his boys not to communicate with the victims again. The victims again returned to Turkey. In between, Babadogan lost his wife and for 18 months didn’t contact the fraudsters. Eventually he did by notifying the fraudster that they wanted to come to Nigeria the third time, to inspect the packed scraped rail parts at the Customs office.
After several discussions through emails and telephone, Mr Babadogan and his team finally came to Nigeria at the invitation of the con men. They arrived on 5th of July, 2008 and were lodged in a very expensive hotel at Ikeja. The next day, according to the complainant, they were taken by the suspects to the Rail Yard to inspect the products which they wanted to purchase. They were so convinced about the deal that it only took two days for a purchase contract to be signed between the parties. With the deal sealed, the victims returned to their country. They had barely arrived, when Chief Uche Dimgba a.k.a Salami Kambo who acted as the managing director of Bulk Telecom Company (BTC), started calling and threatening them that if they did not pay on time, he would call off the deal.
The threat paid off as the victim quickly sent the sum of Eighty Thousand US Dollars ($80,000) to Bulk Telecom Company in Nigeria. After they received the money, the fraudsters requested for more money with the explanation that they paid some to the Lagos State Government, for taking the 12 meters rails to the cutting area to cut to specification and containerized, ready for Customs inspection. With this false information, they got more money from the victim’s company.
Furthermore, suspect Dimgba a.k.a Salami, the self-styled Chief Executive of the fake company requested again for the sum of Sixty Nine Thousand US Dollars ($69,000) from Er-Polat Companies ostensibly as pay-off for the Central Bank of Nigeria to prepare their custom’s papers.
At this point the plaintiff became suspicious and on November 2, 2008 they returned to Nigeria to clear their doubts. As usual, they were well received and lodged into the same hotel they used four months earlier. Their first shock was Dimgba’s anger when they told him that they did not have the $69,000 that he requested for with them. Immediately he told his boys not to communicate with the victims again. The victims again returned to Turkey. In between, Babadogan lost his wife and for 18 months didn’t contact the fraudsters. Eventually he did by notifying the fraudster that they wanted to come to Nigeria the third time, to inspect the packed scraped rail parts at the Customs office.
Finally they arrived in Nigeria on March 1, 2010 and were received at the airport by Eze. The first thing he wanted to confirm was whether they had paid the $69,000 into their account in Hong Kong. This time around, the victims were well prepared. They informed him that they had some friends in Nigeria who are experts and that as soon as they checked and confirmed that the rail scraps are indeed in the container and on sea, they would get their balance. Through the assistance of their Nigerian friends, the turks got to know that it is not possible for a container to be at the seaport for more than 90days, otherwise they would be auctioned.
What eventually did the fraudsters in was an inspection visit by the lawyer to the victim to the site where the Bulk Telecom Company claimed that the 435 containers were. But alas, there was nothing of such! Once they realized that they had been duped, they petitioned the Commission. The operatives of the commission swung into action and swiftly arrested Tijani Ladan.
No comments:
Post a Comment