By Chinelo Nwangene
Feminine Corner has reliably gathered that someunscrupulous men are taking undue advantage of the growing number of young ladies who aredesperate to quit the spinsterhood. These men cash in on the girls’ desperation through sham marriage proposals.
Given the ready availability of social media outlets, especially Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, WeChat, among others, these ladies are ready prey for deceptively innocuous messages from so-called wife-searching guys. As is the custom of social media flirting, these guys would profess their affection and undying desire to settle down with a lady, cooking up ready-made reasons for picking their target prey out of the millions of other single ladies online. Although quite a handful of relationships which kicked off from the social media have been known to graduate to marriages in Nigeria in recent times, the statistics of such relationships which ended up sour, occasioningregrets and terrible heart breaks remain high.
Some of the cases have been such that the victims, mainly ladies,got tricked into coughing out money (to the bogey groom) for really advanced wedding plans before they finally discovered that they had been duped. While most victims of online dating/marriage scam choose to keep their ordeal and disappointments secret, others have shared their stories in the hope that other would-be victims would not fall prey to the next marriage fraudster many of whom are on the prowl these days. We delay here the tales of woe as disclosed by our respondents to whom we are very grateful to rely on in serving you, our valuable reader. Some of the names have been tweaked, where necessary, just to protect the identity of those respondents who have so requested. As would be expected, any instances of similar or identical names of known persons would only be coincidental.
Tales of victims:
A marriage plan between a charming lady, Cynthia and a jovial, well-to-do guy, Chibudo, recently ended on a dramatic sour note. The pair met in December 2016 during one of those Christmas outings and, following what could be adjudged love at first sight, exchanged phone contacts. They kept in touch on social media and telephone for the next one year and some months, during which period they got to build an intimate relationship that both thought was heading for marriage.
When Chibudoexpressed his desire to meet Cynthia’s family with a view to paying her bride price during the Easter holiday, she was literally in the moon. It was finally a dream come true and she did not hesitate to inform her friends and relations about her impending marriage. The preparations dragged on for weeks and everything was going according to plan. According to Cynthia, “I was in the village with my parents, siblings, relations and well-wishers cooking and arranging things all in anticipation of the arrival of my ‘husband’ and his people. The day wore on until, in reaction to several inquiries from family and guests, I put a call through to Chibudo. I needed to know the cause of the delay in their arrival. His phone was switched off! Till this day, Chibudo and I have not spoken on phone, chatted on social media or met again, Cynthia,” disclosed!
READ ALSO : World Bank distances self from co-operative scheme scam
Another lady who preferred to be identified simply as ‘Miss Chinasa’ was a 200 level undergraduate in a university in Anambra state, South Eastern Nigeria when she got a friend request from a handsome Igbo guy named Chibuzor on Facebook. She was initially skeptical about the guy and his intentions, but as friendly chats ensued between them and Chibuzor began to openly show affections to her, she too began to loosen up and they exchanged phone numbers and started exchanging calls.
Soon, his flirting emboldened and few months later, he invited her for a face-to-face meeting at Enugu where he claimed that he was serious about taking the relationship to the next level. “I turned down his invitation onabout four occasions, giving him one excuse or the other until he chose to come by himself”, Chinasa recalled.
“One Saturday morning, I received a call from him that he would be coming to see me and my parents the following Thursday. Ofcourse, all through our chats and phone calls, he was not talking about mere dating; it was all about marriage. I, therefore, welcomed his idea of his coming to see my parents in Anambra state,” she added.
On the appointed day, Chibuzo called to inform Chinasa that he was already on his way to Anambra state. Out of anxiety, she forfeited her lectures for the day and went about preparations to host the husband-to-be. In her bid to give him a nice treat, she spent all her upkeep moneyin preparing what he had informed her was his favourite delicacy – pounded yam and Onugbu soup with assorted meat and fish. But Chibuzor failed to show up!
“I waited for the whole day at home but didn’t see him. I called his phone and it was switched off. I was worried and when I told one of my roommates about it, she advised me to calm down, suggesting that it was possible his phone battery hadgone too low. She believed he would still call as soon as possible after recharging his phone. But I remained worried about what could make him not to call or send a message to me before his phone went dead”, she told Orient Daily.
Chinasa was still in melancholy mood Friday morning when she got a phone call from the suitor informing her in a calculated frightening tone that he was involved in a ghastly motor accident on his way to Awka. According to him, his vehicle killed a woman and as a result, an irate mob nearly lynched him, but he was lucky to have been arrested and taken to police custody. “As he was still explaining, a man who claimed to be the Investigative Police Officer (IPO) handling the case snatched the phone from him and started telling me that the man was in serious trouble and that it was a serious offence of manslaughter. He claimed that Chibuzor would be charged to court and sent to prison if we did not follow the case up.
“When the police officer finished speaking to me, Chibuzor asked me to send him recharge card to recharge his phone even though his phone was with the police man. I was panicky andquickly did as he requested more out of shock than anything else at that moment.
Chibuzor and the ‘policeman’ kept calling Chinasa, requesting for urgent money for one thing or the other to avoid sending him to jail and within some days, she had spent up to N25,000; with some of the money borrowed from school mates just to secure his release from ‘detention’. It was when the con duo called one afternoon and demanded for another N40,000 to be sent that things began to unravel.
“I told him that I didn’t have such amount and he suggested that I should look for someone to borrow from. I went to a man friend to beg him to lend me N40,000 but he insisted that he will only give me only on the condition that I slept with him. I became more confused because that was the least I expected to hear at that moment. Unfortunately for me, when I told Chibuzor about it, his response was that I should sleep with the man and get the money.
“I was shocked that someone who wanted to marry me would suggest that I sleep with another man to get money. At that stage, I began to have doubts about his love and I quickly called one of my roommates and explained the whole drama to her. I had hardly spoken much when she got hold of the scenario and told me outright that the guy, Chibuzor, was a on a scam mission, a k a 419; that he was never out to see me or my parents but just wanted to trick me and make away with my money. She suggested I shouldn’t pick his call again. When, indeed I didn’t pick his call for some days, he stopped calling and that was how the relationship ended”, she said.
Another victim of scam marriage bid who shared her experience withFeminine Corner recalled: “Jimmy asked me to be his friend and I accepted his request. After some months, he suggested I should visit his home town. I did,met his parents and came back. We agreed he should come over and see my own parents as well. On the day we planned for him todo this,the whole of my householdanxiously awaited his arrival. After many hours, long beyond the expected time of his arrival, he called to say he was involved in an accident, knocked down and killed a small girl. He said he was under arrest. This threw me and the rest of the family off balance. While I was speaking with him to see if there would be any solution to that, he called me and requested for recharge card and some money. He told me that he didn’t have access to his phone but that one of the policemen could help him out. I suggested going to see him but he said that the police people would not allow me to see him.
“In the evening, he called me again and said that one of the policemen asked him for N100,000 to enable him close the case before the parents of the child would come over.He pleaded with me to look for wherever possible to get the money which he would refund as soon as he came out free. In the effort to raise the money, my sister took me to a lawyer friend of hers who told us Jimmy was a 419 person and suggested that the best way to handle himwas to tell him that I had a lawyer who would help him in the case. When I told him so, he refused vehemently. That was when I knew that, as the lawyer said, I had been dealing with a scammer. I stopped calling him and he, too, stopped calling me”.
Another unidentified victim told Feminine Cornerher own story. She was, in fact, cohabiting with a scammer. Hear her: “I met Chidiebere when I got my job as a receptionist and he indicated interest in marrying me. We loved each other and lived together. After some months, he came to my house and met my parents and they welcomed him. We started living as husband and wife. He claimed to live abroad and that he had small issues with his visa which he was hoping to resolve and travel back. I soon became pregnant for him and stopped my job. But when my little savings could no longer take care of both of us, he started misbehaving. I went to his home town to report to his kindred,since he had claimed he was an orphan. It was thenI discovered that he was married with five kids. His kinsmen pleaded with my people to forgive him, saying they had been warning him to desist from the act and focus on his family instead of bringing cursesonhimself by engaging in fake marriage.
Readers will recall the story of a 45-year-old man, Raphael Emmanson, who was declared wanted by the police. He was alleged to have obtained N450,000 from a lady, Miss Chinedu Chukwu, under the false pretence of marrying her and to procuring visa for both to travel abroad as husband and wife.
Mr. Emmanson not only duped Miss Chukwu of the said amount, he also made the victim to lose her fiancé and her well-paying job with a pharmaceutical company before he fled. It was gathered that the spinster suffered her fate after she met Emmanson at a park in Abuja where he pretended to be stranded and she innocently decided to assist him.
Emmanson, who said to be from Okigwe in Imo state, deceived Miss Chukwu by telling her that he came to Abuja to procure visa to travel abroad but was stranded and needed a place to sleep till the next day that he purportedly had an appointment with the embassy.
READ ALSO : Why Obiano donated patrol vehicles to Security Agencies
She took pity on him and drove him to her house after explaining to her fiancé what happened. After taking Emmanson home where she introduced him to her fiancé, the pair became friends and, after a while, he masterminded the collapse of her relationship with her fiancé by promising her marriage plus luxurious travel abroad.
It was through that deceit that he managed to obtain the money from her to procure visa. After she gave him the money, the suspect disappeared and fled to Lagos. After months of frantic search, Emmanson was eventually found and arrested in his hideout in a hotel at Shasha area by the police. Upon his arrest, it was discovered that the suspect is married with two children. He was later taken to Ejigbo Magistrate’s court where he was charged with obtaining under false pretence and stealing under the Criminal Code. Expectedly, he pleaded not guilty to the charge.
The presiding Magistrate Mr J.O.E. Adeyemi granted him bail and remanded him in prison custody pending when he would perfect his bail. However, when he was released from custody, Emmanson managed to escape again and reportedly failed to re-appear in court to face trial.
Consequently, the court declared him wanted and ordered for his arrest while the matter was adjourned. Orient Daily could not ascertain whether Emmanson has been finally apprehended again, or whether Miss Chukwu was able to reconcile with her fiance.
One thing is sure, not as many people who are making marriage promises are genuinely interested in settling down with you. Some are after sleeping with you or duping you of huge sums of money as happened to Cynthia, Chinasa ad Miss Chukwu. This is not to talk of the unquantifiable psychological damage and loss of personal dignity suffered by these ladies.Always be on the guard and, please, please, avoid desperate search for husband. Be careful and double check on the guy and get your facts correct before dancing to his tunes.
As a rule of thumb, you should never pay for somebody you have never met. If he insists on you sending him money, tell him to borrow and you pay later when he finally arrives or completed the promised journey.
READ ALSO : Kidnappers kept victims in Rivers after getting N5.3million ransom