Ola Olukoyede, the chairman of the EFCC, has sounded the alarm about the escalating national shame brought on by internet fraudsters, widely known as “Yahoo-Yahoo” boys.
In a media briefing held in Abuja, Olukoyede pointed out the effects of cybercrime on Nigeria’s reputation globally and its internal security situation.
He expressed concern that these fraudsters have led to a general suspicion of Nigerians abroad, particularly at immigration checkpoints.
“I want Nigerians to know that we are having a crisis on our hands. If you travel abroad with your green passport and stand in the queue among so many people, you will discover that by the time you present the passport, the people (immigration officers) will look at you with some reservation. That is, if they don’t take you aside to carry out some special scrutiny. That is a national shame that some young Nigerians (yahoo-yahoo boys) have caused for us. “I go out to interact with my counterpart and other government agencies abroad in the course of tracing money and recovering assets. And there are things that it would be difficult for you to defend,”
“Nigerians should look at them beyond just yahoo-yahoo. We arrested a 22-year-old; he had a turnover of over N5 billion within 18 months. We discovered that he laundered money for politically exposed people. A boy who has never worked in his life. They used them to steal government money now. They do ritual killings. They are also involved in cybercrime. You see them in hotels and in groups trying to scam people. You see secondary school students driving vehicles. Are those the people we want to hand Nigeria over to? Is that the nation we want to build?”
