Internet fraud activity, popularly known as “Yahoo, Yahoo” is booming in Abraka community and environs in Delta State as youths including secondary school students, and university dropouts are now sulked into the scam which involves duping unususpecting members of the public of huge amounts under the guise of offering them a better business deal.
It was gathered that the “trade”, currently trending in Abraka and environs, has become a “skill acquisition venture” for youths within the ages of 15 and 25 years, who are backed by heavy weight “masters” who had been on the illicit trade and are now masters in the game.
Sources in Abraka university community say the Yahoo, Yahoo boys recruit teenage ”apprentices” who understudy them and collect forty per cent of whatever their clients pay.
Only last Monday, a JSS 2 student in one of the secondary schools in Abraka identified as Sunday, was arrested by the police in the area for Yahoo, Yahoo business.
Sunday, who spoke to journalists in the area, said, “I am from a very poor home, my parents have managed to pay school fees to this stage, at a point they told me to drop out of school because they could no longer afford my school fees. I refused and vowed that I will work harder to pay for my education, and I joined the Yahoo, Yahoo group where I have been doing well before nemesis caught up with me”
Further investigation revealed that apart from the involvement of teenage girls and boys in the Yahoo, Yahoo business across the state, they are heavily backed by powerful native doctors who prepare charms purportedly with human parts for them to succeed.
A native doctor, who spoke to DAILY POST in Asaba on condition of anonymity, said, “we prepare charms for these fraudsters to succeed and they pay us well, but they are not allowed to sleep with women during which they use the charms prepared in native soaps to bath. No job for youths again hence the increasing rate of Yahoo, Yahoo boys and girls”.
Acting Police Public Relations Officer in the State, ASP Chucks Orisewezie confirmed that the Police attached to Abraka Police division at the weekend arrested six suspected Yahoo, Yahoo boys, and recovered eight laptops from them, disclosing that the suspects upon interrogation, claimed they were undergraduates of the state university in the community.
Orisewezie, who spoke to newsmen in the Asaba, said, “the suspects claimed they were undergraduates of DELSU. Investigation is ongoing, the suspects were arrested on Intelligence gathering by men of Abraka Police station, and on completion of investigation, the suspects will be charged to court. The Police are working very hard to bring to book those internet fraudsters in Abraka community and its environs. It is operation no mercy”.
In Obiaruku community, a resident who spoke to DAILY POST on condition of anonymity said” we no longer carry anything incriminating in our cars again. Our phones are now empty and nobody can keep anything in it again. The security agents are seriously after us since Abraka community is now the hub of Yahoo, Yahoo business. If anyone carries incriminating materials, the security agents are happy to arrest the person.”
