8th November, 2010
A lonely British woman, who fell in love with a Nigerian man she met on the internet, has been duped of £40, 000 (about N10 million), British newspapers have reported.
Fifty-four year old Coroline Gates-Fleming met Stephen Ehiamhen, a Nigerian, on a website called Match.com and immediately fell in love with him.
However, after some love letters, Ehiamhen suggested to Caroline to invest about N10 million in oil bunkering in the Niger Delta where he could make up to £1.5 million in return. She will be given part of the returns on investment.
She agreed and it tuned out to be a scam.
Caroline said that Ehiamhen first advertised on the site as Sabastine Roland. He used a fake picture and posed as a Greek and claimed to be an entrepreneur in Nigeria.
“He was vague about his age,†she said. “First it was 47, then 37. He told me that when he applied for a visa to travel to South Africa, he had been advised to say 27 so that he could make out he was a student going to the World Cup,†Caroline said.
“After two emails, he phoned. I knew the moment I heard him that he wasn’t Greek.’
In fact, while ‘Sab’s’ English was limited, he most certainly did not speak the language of Sophocles, preferring a version of pidgin laced with dialect and slang that is widely spoken in Nigeria,†she said.
They then arranged to meet in Johannesburg, South Africa. “We had breakfast in the airport, then went to a hotel. I gave him presents. He cried. I showered. We talked. “God, you’re so beautiful,†he kept saying. “You only look 30.â€
Ehiamhen has not yet been arrested.
—Simon Ateba
