Tag Archives: Blackmail

UPDATE: “I will meet Sowore in court, I have evidence of blackmail” – Fatodu

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Lekan Fatodu, the UK-based journalist who accused Omoyele Sowore, publisher of Sahara Reporters, of criminal defamation, says he has nothing personal against him but they must meet in court.

Describing the owner of the news website as his friend of over 20 years, Fatodu said both of them fell out after he refused to give in to Sowore’s demand of a N100 million bribe.

Fatodu said he got a contract from the office of Sambo Dasuki, former national security adviser (NSA), which he delivered and the federal government was satisfied, but  Sowore demanded his own cut from the deal.

The online publisher denied the allegation, saying he had never taken bribe, and could not even solicit such from someone like Fatodu.

“This is someone I bought a ticket for to get out of this country. I was the first person that bought him ticket to leave this country. If I want bribe, it won’t be from him,” he told TheCable.

“Jonathan was there distributing money like water and they would have loved to give me, but I didn’t collect. If I was president of the University of Lagos students’ union and I didn’t take bribe, if I have been doing Sahara Reporters for 10 years without taking bribe, why will I take bribe from him?”

But Fatodu said he had compelling evidence against his estranged friend, and he had made up his mind on suing him to court.

“I am charging Sowore to court, I am pushing a criminal case, a threat to my life, and I am doing it today. I have compelling evidence against him. I have known Sowore for almost 20 years. He demanded N100 million from me from a fictitious N500 million contract from the office of the former national security adviser (NSA),” he told TheCable.

“I did a contract with the ex-NSA in 2014, and my name has not been put out for committing any crime in the course of the contract. I delivered the contract, and the NSA office was satisfied.

“So, for Sowore who is always looking for someone to rubbish to come after me is strange. This is a man I helped when he was begging for assistance, and I have evidence. I have pushed him to where he is, so he should allow me live my life.

“I have never heard that it is a crime to have a contract with government, inasmuch as you deliver what you have been given money for and you do it legitimately.

“There is no reason why he should come after me. He started calling me in 2016, asking for a cut. He said the federal government had asked people to appear before a verification committee on contracts, but the government only listed companies and not individuals.

“I don’t have anything to hide. My refusal to give in to Sowore’s selfish demand made him to malign me and also issue a threat. I have a recording where Sowore said his bank account is bigger than mine. He has been doing this to a lot of people, but today is his day.

“I have nothing personal against him; Sowore is my friend, but I have to defend my rights. Some people are saying it is a civil case, and it doesn’t warrant police intervention. Threat to life is not a civil case, it is a criminal offence.”

Fatodu said the only condition for not going to court was for Sowore to tender an apology.

“He needs to tender an apology over his dubious story before I can consider settling any issue. That is how it is done in any decent society,” he said.

Told to react to the allegation that he was acting on behalf of aggrieved politicians whose deeds had been exposed by the activist-journalist, Fatodu said: “This is strictly between us. I am not fighting on anyone’s behalf. I am just out to defend my rights. This is a threat to my life here.”

But Sowore said there was a grand conspiracy against him, and that he was prepared to go any mile to defend himself.

He accused the police of taking sides with his accuser.

“I was physically attacked by this guy and the police was called. When we got to the police station, they changed the story,” he said.

“The commissioner of police said he had a petition against me. And I was furious, because here was a guy who nearly killed me. That’s the story, not the red herring that I demanded money.

“This problem started in January 2016 when I wrote a story on him being a front for Femi Fani-Kayode. He came and even sent people to beg me to take the story down, but I said I don’t take stories on my website down because I have evidence.

“He then moved to threat, but if he has evidence that I demanded money from him, wouldn’t he have put the information out there? What has he been waiting for since January 2016? I do not demand bribe to do stories, I did not demand a kobo from him, never. Why didn’t he give you the evidence?”

Sowore said he was aware that a governor had called Fatodu to congratulate him on the latest development, but he was not worried.

“I am an activist, activism is what I do. People can hate me or love me for it. That’s what I do. I am not afraid. I heard that a governor has called to congratulate him,” he said.

“If you see the story they were pushing out yesterday, you will know that this is a serious conspiracy. Even the statement released by the police…. I love this country so much. I know there are a lot of people working behind the scene, but I am not afraid.”

Buhari Decries Blackmail Of Senior Government Officials

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President Muhammadu Buhari has appealed to discerning Nigerians to ignore orchestrated attempts to sully the integrity of senior government officials, who are being tarred with the brush of corruption without any concrete evidence.

The president made the appeal in a statement issued in Abuja on Tuesday by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina.

Buhari, according to the statement, was reacting to online media reports, alleging that the immediate past Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr Ibe Kachikwu, is being investigated over crude oil swap deals and gas lifting during his tenure as GMD of the petroleum corporation.

The statement quoted President Buhari as appealing for decent and civilised comments, “particularly when it has to do with the integrity of those who are serving the country.

“Terrible and unfounded comments about other people’s integrity are not good.

“We are not going to spare anybody who soils his hands, but people should please wait till such individuals are indicted.”

Buhari reiterated the administration’s commitment to probity, accountability and integrity, promising that transparency remained a watchword, which would never be trifled with.

Credit: Guardian

DSS Arrest 3 Over Alleged Plot To Blackmail DSS DG

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The Department of State Services (DSS) says it has arrested three suspects (name withheld), who, according to the agency, have perfected plans to blackmail Alhaji Lawal Daura, the Director-General of the service.

 

Presenting the suspects before newsmen, on Friday in Abuja, an official of the service, Abdullahi Garba, said that they were arrested on Feb. 17 in Kaduna and Abuja respectively.

 

Garba explained that they claimed that the director-general had collected the sum of N4 billion from the PDP governors of Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Abia and Taraba, to influence Supreme Court judgments in their favour.

 

He said the suspects were also to misinform President Muhammadu Buhari and the Nigerian public that the director-general had acquired choice property in Maitama and Asokoro areas of Abuja

 

“The overall objective was to scare the director-general and put him under pressure just for the group to extort money from him to serve their pecuniary interest.”

 

Garba added that the director-general could not have helped the same PDP governors who daily accused him of not supporting them.

 

He said that the activities of the group had become widespread, adding that it took advantage of the sustained war against corruption to further their illegal act.

 

“A method used by the group is to tell lies against their victims and also plant rumours about them in certain government circles.”

 

Garba said that they also used scaremongering and name dropping to deceive their victims to part with money.

 

He said that the service would not be distracted in its commitment to the anti-corruption war and warned mischief makers and self appointed security experts to desist from dabbling into sensitive security matters.

 

“It is to be emphasised that the service will not hesitate to decisively deal with such persons and groups within the ambit of the law,”he said.

 

Meanwhile, the trio, who hail from Kaduna, Borno and Katsina, however, denied the allegation, saying that they were arrested on false allegation.

 

(NAN)

Scammer Arrested For Blackmailing Late M.K.O Abiola’s Wife

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Caleb Nzube, a 26 year old man who attempted to blackmail the wife of late Chief MKO Abiola of $5,000, was last week arrested in Anambra State.
According to reports, Nzube allegedly hacked the Twitter handle of Mrs Tinu Abiola, downloaded her picture and designed a web page showing her carrying a human skull.

He then threatened to expose the web page to the world if the she did not pay $5,000.
Mrs Abiola in turn, refused to be blackmailed so she contacted Inspector General, Solomon Arase, who directed a combined team of the Inspector General Monitoring Team and the Intelligence
Response Team to track down the suspect.

He was arrested when the operatives stormed his hideout in Obosi.

It was gathered that Mrs Abiola was not the suspect’s only victim, it was leanred that he was harassing 2 other people.
According to Vanguard, Caleb Elom Nzube admitted that he is an internet fraudster who specialised in online dating before diverting into blackmail.
He said:

“I started following Mrs Timu Alade Abiola on Twitter and I got her pictures. I felt she was a good catch and I decided to blackmail her. I used Photoshop to make it look like she was carrying a human skull. I designed a web page with a little gossip story on it that she was caught for ritual.

“I sent her the link and when she saw it I demanded she pays me $5000 or I will show it to the whole world. One of her friends came in and begged that I shouldn’t do it and that they were ready to pay me $ 2000. I rejected the money, insisting that I must collect the amount I demanded”.

“Later they discovered I was Igbo and they gave my number to an Igbo girl who started talking to me and I accepted their offer, what got me angry was that while we were still talking, they sent a fishing link that destroyed my website which I have been maintaining for more than four years. That website had paid me little money I have used in sustaining myself”.

“I told the Igbo girl about it and that if I don’t get the money before the end of the week I will show the web page to the whole world. She asked for my account, I gave it to her but before I knew what was happening, the police came and arrested me”.

“I don’t understand why she has to bring in the police; I told the girl that what I needed was for her to tell her madam to just pay me for my website they destroyed. In fact I regret all this, if I had known it will be this messy I would have not ventured into this. What I do is only dating. I just wanted to try my luck on this one.”

Source: Vanguard

Impeachment: Ex-Speaker Accuses Fayose, Assembly Of Blackmail

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Ex-Speaker of Ekiti State House of Assembly, Adewale Omirin, has said that the public show made of the rejection of his letter to the House seeking the reversal of his impeachment was an attempt to blackmail him.
He said that governor Ayodele Fayose, the Speaker, Hon Kola Oluwawole, and the Clerk of the Assembly, Mr. Tola Esan, had fore-knowledge of the letter he wrote requesting reversal of his impeachment, wondering why they had to make a public show of a legitimate request.
Omirin had, in a letter dated October 15, 2015 and addressed to the Speaker of the Assembly, prayed the House to revert his November 20, 2014 impeachment by seven members of the immediate past House of Assembly and restore all his rights and privileges.

The ex-speaker also urged the Assembly to obliterate the records of the factional speaker, Hon Dele Olugbemi, describing his emergence as a constitutional infarction that should not be contemplated under a democratic setting.
Speaking in Ado-Ekiti during a visit to the secretariat of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Omirin said he had earlier been advised by top members of the party to go to court on the issue, following which he instructed his lawyer to contact the Clerk of the Assembly to request for the extract of November 20, 2014, sitting when the impeachment was carried out.
Omirin alleged that the House, which saw the coming litigation as too diversionary to the current Assembly agreed to begin a process of reversing the impeachment through legislative procedure, which compelled him to write the letter as an instrument for the house to work with.
The Chairman, House Committee on Information, Hon. Gboyega Aribisogan, who responded to Omirin’s allegation said : “As far as this House is concerned, no discussion took place between Omirin and Governor Fayose, the Speaker and the Clerk before the letter was brought to the Assembly.
“What the House did was to react to the letter we deliberated upon and which we published and this should not be mistaken for blackmail.
“We don’t want the matter to be subjected to rumour. The letter is a document of the House and we can do whatever we like with it.”

 

Credit : Vanguard

You Can’t Blackmail Us, PDP Tells Buhari

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The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has said that no amount of “intimidation, blackmail and propaganda” by the Presidency would stop it from demanding that President Muhammadu Buhari kick-starts government and commence implementation of his campaign promises for which he was voted into office.

PDP had on Sunday said that Mr. Buhari’s first 30 days in office saw Nigeria only in motion without movement.

Mr. Buhari promptly replied the PDP saying he is taking his time to clean the rot left by the party.

The PDP, however, said the Presidency’s excuse of clearing the “so-called Augean Stable” is lame and diversionary noting that it stands by its statement that the delay is creating loopholes through which some persons claiming closeness to the President have infiltrated executive bodies, arm-twisting and conniving with unscrupulous elements in the bureaucracy to syphon the nation’s resources in the last 30 days.

The PDP National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, in a statement on Monday said the party would not in any way be cowed by threats and wild allegations by the Presidency into abdicating its responsibility of speaking out as an opposition party where the system is derailing.

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