JOHANNESBURG, South Africa-The Nigerian National Committee on Financial Crimes (NCFC) recently announced that it apprehended a suspect who is believed to have been involved in the sale of Nitel subscriber identity module (SIM) cards and recharge vouchers that were fraudulently obtained.
Jimoh Lawal, a member of the committee, said the suspects were able to lodge fake bank drafts into Nitel’s accounts at Zenith International Bank as a payment for the SIM packs and recharge vouchers.
Lawal added that the suspects impersonated two Nitel dealers, and using the fake money drafts, were able to gain entrance into the Nitel offices and collect goods worth US$64,000 between 19 and 23 September, 2002.
Nitel management detected the fraud and reported it to the police on 25 September. The chief suspect was arrested on 2 October, 2002, with SIM packs worth 2.75 million Nigerian naira (US$21,284). Two other suspects remain at large.
The Committee has absolved Nitel of any internal conspiracy with the fraudsters, saying the release of goods to dealers even before confirming the bank drafts was a demonstration of its customer-friendly services. However, the committee did advise Nitel to “adopt a more fraud-proof sales procedure to avoid a re-occurrence of such acts.”
