The suspect allegedly collected the money from his victims in the guise of helping them to ‘ fight poverty. ’
Obi , founder of Beloved Gideon Foundation, based in Agbor , Delta State , with outreaches in Bayelsa , Onitsha, Lagos , Port Harcourt, Abuja , and Benin City , however , denied any involvement in fraud claiming that he was only “ doing the will of God by trying to help the people fight poverty. ”
According to a statement by the acting EFCC spokesman , Tony Orilade , in Abuja on Monday , Obi said it was his desire and God ’ s will to see people prosper that led him into operating what appears to be a Ponzi scheme.
Obi , who claimed to be a consecrated Bishop with a diploma in theology explained that he was selling what he called nuggets for successful living to subscribers to the scheme.
He said , “ We write books such as ‘ 24 Nuggets for Successful Living ’ , ‘ 36 Nuggets for Successful Living ’ , ‘ 48 Nuggets for Successful Living ’ . We organise seminars and conferences on how to be successful and tell the people to subscribe to these publications .
“ If you subscribe with N10 , 800 , we give you N 15 , 000 . If you subscribe with N 18 , 000 , we give you N 23 , 000 . I had about 30 , 000 subscribers and I was paying them. ”
According to him , when he left Agbor for Lagos , his desire was to expand his subscription base but his subscribers were impatient .
“ If they had allowed me to hold the conference in Lagos , I would have paid them, ” he claimed .
However , some of his victims who thronged the EFCC office since his arrest , described him as a fraudster , claiming he defrauded them.
A victim , Janet Okafor reportedly told the EFCC that Obi claimed to be a representative of Gideons International , an organisation that distributes Bibles and Christian literature .
She said , “He organised seminars in Agbor market and claimed that he was from Gideons International and that their mission was to help eradicate poverty in Nigeria . He told us that unlike in the past when Gideons International distributed Bibles and Christian literature , their mission now was to eradicate poverty. ”
On how she became a victim of the scheme, Okafor , 35 , who claimed she had never participated in any ponzi scheme in the past said she fell for his tricks because “ the Bishop swore with the Bible . ”
“ The Bishop knelt down and swore with the Bible ; He convinced us that he was from Texas , USA and we believed him . I subscribed with N10 , 800 and he paid me N15 , 000 . It was after this that he engaged over 60 of us as canvassers . I brought many people including my relations and friends . All together , they invested over N5 million , ” the victim was quoted as saying .
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