212 african appropriations
business proceedings. One author observes that “419 is a business where
t he power f u l i n fluence of offic ia l doc u ment s on m i l l ions of people a l l over
the world is made manifest” (Igwe 2007: 65).
According to Chidi Nnamdi Igwe (2007: 57), who presents remarkable
insights into scammers’ strategies gained through interviews with fraud-
sters in Nigeria, scammers differentiate between “obedient mugus” and
“st ubbor n mugus.” “The stubborn ones are those who ask a lot of questions.
They are likened to the doubting Thomas, who was always curious and
doubtful, and who acted only when he saw enough convincing evidence.”
Although “stubborn mugus” are difficult to handle, scammers prefer these
kinds of victims because once all their questions are answered and all their
doubts dispelled, such victims rarely turn back. Among the sophisticated
tools used to convince reluctant marks are fake websites—scammers cre-
ate websites for bogus institutions (banks, security firms, lottery compa-
nies) or bogus websites for real institutions (Glickman 2005). A victim
may even be asked to open an account at a sham internet bank operated
by the scammer, eventually seeing a large sum of money transferred to the
account, only to learn that another fee is required to move the money to
the victim’s own bank account abroad (Edelson 2006). A similar tactic—
also based on the notion that seeing is believing—is what scammers call
“flashing the mugu’s account” (Igwe 2007: 75). This involves depositing an
electronic check in the victim’s bank account. The mark can then see the
money has arrived.^4 The victim may be told the deal will fall through un-
less a final fee is paid by a certain deadline; he or she pays the fee for fear of
losi ng out. A s it ta kes severa l day s for a n e-check to clea r, t he f raud ster t hen
cancels it before payment is delivered, and he disappears into the ether.
Under certain circumstances, when scammers finally meet their vic-
tims face-to-face, 419 scams may develop into elaborate scenarios. In such
cases, scammers continue the rouse, upping the stakes by perpetuating
the fraud in person, at staged meetings, held either on the premises of
institutions at which they pretend to work or nearby—for example, in of-
fices rented in the same building as a bank branch. Barrister Usman Bello
provided the following description of a successful but costly case:
The best scam I have done is from Russia, crude oil investment supply. I
only used Yahoo mail and the search machine of Google. A fter searching