Nigerian banker Anthony Owuye loses no opportunity to voice his bitterness after failing to clinch promising partnership deals with British banks.
He blames it all on Nigeria's legion of con artists who have gained worldwide notoriety for their 419 scam letters -- so-called after a section of the Nigerian penal code.
"The first British counterpart I spoke to warned me that this would not be easy, and that the likelihood of success was very low," recalled Owuye, chairman of Lagos-based Personal Trust Savings and Loans Ltd.
"Foreigners will always think first of 419 when it comes to Nigerians. The process can be a humiliating one," Owuye told Reuters in his office in the Surulere district of Lagos.
A photo on a wall of the modest office shows the banker in an embrace with Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, whose declared war on corruption has apparently failed to deter those perpetrating the scams.
Nigeria's image took a further battering on February 19 after a 72-year-old Czech who lost his life savings in an apparent oil investment scam shot dead a Nigerian diplomat in the country's embassy in Prague.
Czech police have not elaborated on the killing of consul Michael Lekara Wayid in the most high-profile murder linked to Nigerian white-collar crime.
Nigerian conmen have swindled hundreds of millions of dollars from gullible Americans and Europeans responding to 419 junk letters promising recipients a share of non-existent fortunes, according to international crime agencies.
The scams come in a variety of forms including money transfer schemes, charitable donations, fake government contracts, cheap oil deals, black market currency deals and fraudulent business tenders.
Begun in the early 1990s when the economy of the world's seventh largest oil exporter headed downhill, 419s are now probably Nigeria's biggest foreign currency earner after oil and ahead of cocoa exports, according to some estimates.
"If you haven't received any of the Nigerian letters, you probably haven't got an e-mail or other mailing address," said a diplomat in the commercial section of a Western embassy here.
A typical letter, with trademark grotesque grammar, would come purportedly from a senior director of the Nigerian central bank who has incredibly just uncovered hundreds of millions of dollars of illegal contract money.
He needs a foreign partner with a bank account to transfer the funds, in return for a fee, typically about 35 percent, for the foreigner.
Those gullible enough to respond end up losing anything from US$5,000 to US$100,000 in advance fees before they realise no such fortune or central bank official exists.
Officials from the US Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs put the value of an average 419 scam at US$6,000.
RSS