Charity Nwakaudu
For some young men in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja, survival is now a case of when the going gets tough, the tough gets going. Or how else could one describe the ever proactive antics devised by desperate Abuja young men to take advantage of the ever-increasing number of unmarried working class ladies and married women and make fortunes from them.
Investigations by Daily Sun revealed that with their deceptive rich appearances, they send wrong signals targeted at luring comfortable desperately love-seeking single ladies, single mothers and sugar mummies.
These young men, majorly with poor family background, thrive in packaging themselves to make them presentable as the most potent weapon to toast the beautiful but unmarried ladies. From the proceeds of the fraud and deceptive ill-gotten wealth from their victims, they also spend fortunes to procure classy, flashy cars and the latest fashion to maintain their ‘fake’ social status.
Ridiculous as it may sound, the car usually serves multipurpose as many of them practically live either in their cars or squat with friends somewhere in the city centres. They could do everything possible to deceive or convince their victims, mostly single ladies that they live in highbrow areas of Abuja, not knowing that they are squatting with a friend in one of the satellite towns in Abuja.
Their modus operandi is simple. They make marriage and unrealistic promises to the ladies, who sometimes appear desperate, just to gain their trust. They move in with the ladies and introduce them to some already arranged accomplices that would act as their parents.
Shortly after spending sometimes with the ladies, they would come with one calculated lies after another to parasitically make them their stream of income. To some of them, they would claim to be embarking on a business trip outside the country only to open channel of income with one form of excuse or the other to milk these rich ladies through their invisible relatives.
Janet Okoro, narrated, how she met one of these men in a friend’s child dedication ceremony and they later became friends. She said the lover boy in sheep’s fraudulent clothing claimed to be a business merchant who just arrived the town to check on some of his debtors, adding that he just accompanied an associate who is a member of the celebrant’s club:
“After few weeks into our friendship, he came to my house and told me that I was very fortunate to have met him. According to him, his mother had been bordering him to get married. He said that if I would marry him he would change my life and stop me from suffering. I accepted his offer.
“He then gave me his mother’s phone number and told me that his mother was excited when he broke the news to her and that she was eager to hear my voice. He pleaded that I call her immediately so that she would know that he was serious.
“I refused to call but that evening a woman who sounded like an elderly woman called and introduced herself as his mother. From that day we started relating on phone.
“Three weeks later, he lied to me that he wanted to make a business trip abroad and that it would take him one month. He said he would be taken some product samples with him and he would stay there until they were produced so that he could meet up with the seasonal demand of the products and sponsor our wedding he fixed on the first Sunday of January 2020.
“He pretended to have left the country one Saturday. He called me with a foreign coded number and reminded me to be calling the mother regularly so she would not feel lonely. I was deceived into accepting, believing that I was doing it for our good.
“I received a call from a strange person who claimed to be a doctor through the mother’s line, requesting me to send N120,000 as medical bill to treat her after falling down and sustaining injuries. I told them that I did not have money but would get to the son. The son called later that he heard that his mother was in the hospital that I should try and give them the money that he would refund me.
“When he noticed that I was not ready to send the money, he pleaded with me to send airtime to those with her in the hospital so they could sell and take care of their transport and feeding. Immediately I sent it, all the contacts they used in calling me stopped going through and I have not heard from him till date.”
Another victim in Kubwa, Vivian Adeyi, recalled how she met a guy through a friend and he introduced himself as an importer of goods from China. She said her lover boy took her to different shops where they sell electronics and told her that they were his customers and that most of them owed him and that he was still in town to recover his debts:
“I asked him why are they were staring at me like that and his response was that they have not seen him intimately with a woman in the past. He later proposed marriage to me and I innocently accepted.
“Trouble started when one day, he requested for N400,000 from me to clear his goods at the port. Although I could not afford the whole sum, I however gave him N150,000. He continued asking and collecting more money from me till one day, I did not see him again.
“When I visited those shops he took me to, they said he did not either have any shop or imported any good. That was how he left with everything that I have laboured for in Abuja.”
For a resident of Maitama, Ene Ikwu, it was the same lamentation and woes. She admitted being the architect of her own predicament. She lamented that despite repeated warnings from friends to be careful with online dating, she refused to adhere:
“I met this clean and good looking young man on Facebook. We started dating, after a while he introduced me to his mother who he claimed had been on his neck to get married.
“He then visited me here in Abuja and told me he was traveling that weekend in preparation for December. He urged me to take care of his mother till he returned. Few days after, we started communicating through a foreign number. A strange number called me, introducing himself as a doctor calling from a hospital in Calabar.
“He told me that my guy’s mother fell down in the bathroom and was brought to hospital unconscious. He pleaded that they needed money to start treatment immediately.
“But because I have heard series of stories on ladies that were duped, I told them that I did not have money that they should call her son. They started insulting me that I was not ashamed of myself that I am living in Abuja and I don’t have money. They instantly blocked me both on Facebook and all the contacts they used in calling.”
Agatha Johnson, was not that lucky as they did not only rob her, but also destroyed her two year-old relationship, leaving her with an additional burden:
“I met the young handsome looking young man at a wedding I attended with my fiancé. He featured as a guest artist and we exchanged contacts. Foolishly, I broke up with my fiancé and fell for him.
“After three months, I discovered I was pregnant. When I told him, he said a lot of people were owing him, that I should bring whatever I have to avoid the shame, that he would pay me some. I withdrew everything I had and handed over to him to start the preparation. That was the last day I heard or saw him.”