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Sadly, in the last few years, Nigeria has become associated with a spate of internet and email based scams. Wealthy ‘princes’ desperately in need of your help (or naivety) would like you to benefit from helping them too. This scam concept is one of the oldest in the books. As they say, “You can’t con an innocent man.” The people who fall for email scams tend to be aware of the illegality of the supposed transaction but still want the reward. And that’s exactly what happened in the mother-of-them-all Nigerian airport scam. Someone wanted to get rich quick and was willing to overlook common sense to do so.

The Nigeria and Brazil airport scam

The story takes place in pre-global-dominance-of-the-internet land, circa 1995 and 1998. Emmanuel Nwude, the supposed villain in the story contacted Brazilian, Nelson Sakaguchi, the total sap, and told him he had an airport for sale. The asking price was $242 million, a steal for a fully operational airport, but that’s not why Sakaguchi responded. The airport hadn’t even been built yet.

Nelson Sakaguchi was the director of an international bank. He had the funds, not his funds, but of course there was a sweetened on the deal for him. There was $10 million commission to be earned on this transaction. If Sakaguchi could make it happen, he’d be $10 million better off overnight.

How the airport for sale scam worked

Nwude was not a Nigerian Prince, but he was director of Union Bank of Nigeria. This position of trust must have convinced the Brazilian of the authenticity of the proposal. Nwude told him he had learned of Nigeria’s plan to build an airport in Abuja. This may or may not have been true. He was trying to get ahead of the competition and get the deal done ‘between friends’. This kind of corruption is still quite typical. Companies pay good money to get ‘intelligence’ on up coming tenders for things like airports, motorways and hospitals.

As is also the case with these projects, sometimes the investor-contractors have to produce the readies up front. In a sense, you get paid to build an airport while also being and investor. The rational being, you’ll do a better job if your future earnings are also tied in. It’s not uncommon in the Middle East for company directors to contact architects and engineers asking them to design an airport – and by the way, cough up 25% of the cost for the privilege.

Show me the money

As it turns out, Sakaguchi just went along with it and delivered over $100 million to be part of the joint venture. And he waited, and waited, and nothing happened. The start up was slow, his investors got impatient and then they started a complain process.

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In 2004, Abuja’s High Court found Nwude guilty on 86 counts of ‘fraudulently seeking advance fees’. However, is seems in Nigeria at that time, the right response to being arrested for fraud was to attempt to bribe the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) with $75,000 cash. Nwude was charged with15 counts of bribery too.

However, Nwude was already a wealthy man, so rather than a life sentence he got 5 years plus a fine of $10 million. He did two years and was released from prison in 2006. He got off lightly but it’s not surprising. There is an airport in Abuja now, opened in 2006. Turkish Airlines fly there as do Emirates, Lufthansa and British Airways.

In all likelihood Nwude did know of the tender and was just trying to get ahead of the competition. Had it have worked out, Sakaguchi would have got his $10 million and his airport. So next time your friendly Nigerian Prince emails you, think twice – he might actually have a deal.