By Uche Nworah, Ph.D
In the lobby of the hotel in downtown Montreal-Canada where I am staying, this lady strikes up a conversation with me. She was on the verge of checking out from the hotel. I came to inform the front office staff that I was expecting a delivery.
“Hi, are you Nigerian?”, she asked. “From your accent, I could tell”, she continued. We struck up a conversation. She told me her frustration at not being able to bring over a Nigerian man she said lives in Sapele. She said she had sent over a hundred and sixty thousand Canadian dollars to the gentleman to enable him to secure a Canadian student visa.
According to her, it’s been one story after another ever since she met the man online. “I even paid immigration agents in Nigeria ten thousand Canadian dollars to assist”, she said sounding desperate and frustrated.
On inquiry, she said she is divorced and her children think she is being scammed. I didn’t know what to tell her. In my mind, her children may be right. She may be a victim of a love scam. Luckily for me, my Uber ride arrived and I quickly extricated myself from the web of her stories. I didn’t want her to transfer her anger to me as a Nigerian. Moreso, I observed a policeman standing by the lobby. Like we say in Aba, ‘voom ka nma kalia statement’.
