Adaora
Reports
Monday,
November 25, 2002
The
Motivation Behind 419 Scams
Money.
not color Colonialists not to
blame
A contradiction: Oil wealth, yet poor
Corrupt leaders: past and present
Lack of accountability
The North has ruled Nigeria for 36 out of 42
years of independence, be it military or democratic. There have today
thousands of retired soldiers and their civilian accomplices sitting on billions
of dollars stolen from public coffers.
Could the exclusivity of the south in the 419 fraud
business be explained away as their way of getting back at the northerners
for this? Obviously, majority of the scammers could do without the funds
generated from it. However, there is a strong need in them to get even
richer and as the national cake remains as elusive as ever the money has
to come from somewhere else. Anger (over how despite all his
intelligence and sophistication the northerners remain the 'kingmakers')
is the motivation. So, the drive to get a cut of a foreign cake through 419 is
born, bringing the country's name into disrepute. Thereby, avenging the south
on two fronts - make billions and discredit the nation in the process. This
to the chagrin of successive leaders.
Money.
not color
The 419 scam is not limited to the ones
perpetrated on non-Nigerians. There is internal 419 too, this is a modified
version of the international scam but it is an advanced fee fraud
nevertheless.
It is fact that foreigners have been
abducted and killed in Nigeria, however, this has more to do with money than the
color of their skin. In the cases involving oil workers, their Nigerian
counterparts were among those kidnapped and in some cases killed. This was
over compensation denied to landowners by oil companies for degrading their
land. A Nigerian expatriate visiting the country stands as much chance of being
robbed or killed as a white person. The only difference might be that
in the case of the latter the skin color makes the individual more vulnerable.
All the criminals see is £ or $ and not the color of the skin. Majority
of Nigerians are very warm and friendly and do not have a morbid hatred for
white people due to historical reasons.
Colonialists not to
blame.
Today as at the dawn of independence on 1
October 1960 Nigeria is plagued with political instability, corruption, fraud
and embezzlement. Over the years Nigerian analysts have tried to lay the blame
on the colonialists for the state of the country. However, that analysis is
totally wrong and cannot be backed up. While it is fact that Britain - the
colonial masters had stripped the country, they left good legacies too.
Examples are clean and uninterrupted water and electricity supply. A fully
trained and equipped Police Force and Army, the list goes on and on. Today what
you see is just the opposite. For Nigeria there is little hope of change but
this not due to lack of resources.
A contradiction: Oil wealth, yet
poor
Nigeria is endowed with natural resources so
vast that it would have made it a very beautiful country if only it had
good governance to handle her natural endowment. Nigeria has oil reserves of
over 22 billion barrels and there a lot more oil fields that are as yet
untapped. It is a member of the Organization of Petroleum Producing Countries
(OPEC). In 2000 Nigeria was the 5th largest supplier of crude oil to the USA.
The fact is that Nigeria is an oil rich but at the
same time one of the worlds poorest countries. The million dollar question is,
'why so?'.
Corrupt leaders: past and present
The answer can be found in the activities of the
country's past and present leaders. Corruption is socially embedded and there is
no political accountability. Corruption and power abuse is one of the worst
examples of Kleptocratic rule and Kleptocracy and corruption are synonymous with
Nigerian governments since independence. Successive governments have used its
resources to purchase support while increasingly repressing its opponents. The
panel set up to examine government under the late General Abacha found
that $12 billion in oil revenue had been embezzled into what was dubbed
'dedicated accounts'. To date the whereabouts of this money is unknown. This is
just the tip of the iceberg as other leaders have been known to have helped
themselves to much more.
Lack of accountability
With lack of adequate sanctions this state of
affairs is set to continue. There is a linkage between corruption and poverty:
it reduces the size of the economic cake, consequently condemning varying
segments of the population to abject poverty.
-
Adaora, Editor, Fraud Aid.com Nigerian Desk
fraudaid@fraudaid.com,
Attn: Adaora
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