(Codewit) A 30-year old Nigerian man from Delta State has killed himself after announcing the act on his Facebook page. Diano Ovie-Richy committed suicide on Christmas day after posting a macabre note he said was an “Xmas gift†to his facebook friends.
In a final note he left on Facebook on December 25, he told his friends that his death would be his Christmas gift to them. Before taking his own life, the suicide ranted over the refusal of the authorities at Delta State University to issue his B.Sc. degree.
“I’ve had failure in all aspects of my life,†he wrote. “I invested 10 years of my life for a B.Sc yet Umukoro, Oboreh and Odirin ate it up.â€
He went on to blame supernatural powers for his failures in life. “Any business I run always fail, usually due to DEUS EX MACHINA. Some say I need deliverance because I’m cursed.â€
Mr. Ovie-Richy was engaged to marry a young woman named Ariete, but cancelled the wedding even after announcing on December 7, 2011 that he was engaged to her. He also was expecting a baby. “Last month, getting married was aborted though I’m an expecting father.â€
According to his suicide note, he decided to kill himself because he didn’t want his unborn child to see him suffer which would tempt him to take other people’s lives.
In his note, he mentioned three persons he said were appreciative of him: Mudiaga, his elder brother, and Pawon and Nehi, “my only two friends.â€
Saharareporters contacted Charles Muka, the Police PRO of Delta State, for confirmation but he said that the police command had no information of the incident, but would investigate.
Two of the suicide’s Facebook friends, Akpomughe Vivian Jite and Ukane Christian, confirmed his death on their respective facebook pages.
Also in his suicide note, the deceased appealed to people to show love to his unborn child. “Please show my unborn child Omoovie when born in 2012 some love, kindness and favour in anyway you can.â€
“What’re you doing to help the person that is still alive?†he asked Nigerians who might look at him as a coward.
He however took a parting shot at God, “. I hate God 4 allowing d demons 2 continuously destroy my hardwork.â€
SaharaReporters spoke to several family sources in Kokori Township in Ethiope East Local Government Area in Delta state where Ovie hailed from. The sources confirmed that Ovie committed suicide by hanging on December 25th 2011 after leaving his last message on Facebook at 1:29pm via mobile phone. In his last notes, he posted a quote from a popular song by Afro-beat maestro Fela Anikulapo-Kuti: “Double wahala 4 dead body n d owner of dead body.”
Family members also said the suicide was a 2009 graduate of business administration from Delta State University, Abraka.
One source told us that, even though Ovie hanged himself on December 25 2011, his body was found on December 26. A friend described him as a self-motivated young man who wanted to become a successful and famous entrepreneur.
The source said that his problem at the university was related to his final year “Thesis” widely known in Nigerian universities as “final year project.” SaharaReporters learnt that his Head of Department, Dr. F.G. Umukoro, who doubled as his project supervisor, had rejected his final year project because Ovie was late in submitting his final chapters. The friend said that Ovie claimed that it was Dr. Mukoro who had been absent from his duties. He reportedly got angry and refused to complete his project, thereby missing out on his final year graduation and youth service in 2010. The friend claimed all those issues had been resolved and that Ovie was listed to go for his NYSC in February 2012.
Several sources said the tipping point for Ovie was a proposed wedding to his heartthrob, Ochuko also known as Ariete. The wedding had to be postponed because Ovie couldn’t afford the elaborate ceremony. “They had to postpone the wedding date so that Ovie could find enough money to throw a big wedding,†said one source.
A friend of the deceased confirmed that Ariete was four months pregnant at the time Ovie committed suicide.
Ovie was buried on December 26th in a public cemetery in Warri, Delta State after traditional rites were administered. The family did not carry out an autopsy, and neither were the police contacted
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Two realities stand out in the midst of all the noise and fury currently surrounding the debate in and over Iraq.
First, it is clear that the American venture in Iraq has ended in abject failure at the cost of 4,500 American lives and between 100,000 and 200,000 Iraqi lives. No weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, nor was any link established between the Saddam Hussein regime and al Qaeda. Furthermore, as the events of the past few days demonstrate, the United States has been largely unsuccessful in establishing an inclusive, democratic order in Iraq, another objective touted by Washington to justify the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
What the American invasion ended up doing was creating unprecedented sectarian strife and totally debilitating Iraqi capabilities, thus tilting the regional balance of power in the energy-rich Persian Gulf substantially in favor of Iran.
Second, it is only Iran that can now prevent Iraq from sliding into the abyss of chaos and disintegration. This argument has a simple logic. Iran is the country with the greatest leverage with the Shia-dominated al-Maliki government. In fact, al-Maliki would not have been able to put together a coalition after haggling for nine months, and become prime minister for a second time after the last elections, had Iran not weighed in on his behalf. Iran is also the state with the greatest stake in keeping Iraq unified and ensuring its sovereignty, because Iraq’s disintegration could adversely affect Iran’s national integrity and its aspirations to become a regional leader in the Middle East.
While the major Shia parties in Iraq — the Dawa Party, the Sadrists, and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq — are not Iranian creations per se, all of them are beholden to Iran in multiple ways. Their leaders lived in exile in Iran during Hussein’s rule, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps trained their militias. Their links with the IRGC and the militias’ dependence on Iranian training and weaponry continue to exist. Whenever the going gets tough for any Iraqi Shia faction, its leaders take refuge in Iran, as Muqtada al-Sadr did time and again over the past few years.
Iraqi dependence on Iran is bound to grow now that the Americans — who had tended to favor the Shia over the Sunni in Iraq — have departed the shores. The al-Maliki government, its current bombast notwithstanding, will soon realize — if it has not done so already — that it is surrounded by a host of latently hostile Sunni Arab neighbors, from Saudi Arabia and Jordan to Egypt and potentially Syria. Iran is its only dependable ally and one which it cannot afford to alienate.
Iran also forms the lifeline of the Iraqi economy, especially in the predominantly Shia south. Iranian pilgrims flock to the Shia holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, providing livelihood to thousands of Iraqi citizens. Cheap Iranian manufactured products flood the Iraqi market, and Iranian contractors are involved in infrastructure projects such as power, health and housing.
Iran is now Iraq’s second largest trading partner after Turkey, which has a near monopoly on trade with Iraqi Kurdistan. Additionally, Iranian financial support keeps many Iraqi Shia institutions, parties, and leaders afloat.
In short, the Iraqi government’s dependence on Iran in political and economic terms is of a very high order. This provides Tehran with enormous leverage that it can use, if it so desires, to compel the al-Maliki government to undertake a radical course correction and return to the model of a more inclusive political system rather than one based simply on Shia demographic strength. Shiites constitute approximately 60% of the Iraqi population, with Sunni Arabs and predominantly Sunni Kurds each accounting for about 20%.
There is every reason to believe that such a course correction is in Iran’s long-term interest for a number of reasons. First, if the Iraqi state disintegrates as a result of al-Maliki’s policies, Iraqi Kurdistan, currently an autonomous entity, will be emboldened to declare itself a sovereign, independent state. This would run contrary to Iranian state interests, since Iran is also home to a restive Kurdish minority whose demands for autonomy border on independence.
An independent Kurdish state next to Iranian Kurdistan would not only be a bad example (from the perspective of the Iranian state) for Iranian Kurds, it would also become a center for Kurdish irredentism, stoking demands for pan-Kurdish unity that would have deleterious consequences for both Iran and Turkey.
Second, Iran has regional ambitions not only in the Persian Gulf, but also in the broader Middle East region. The Iranian regime is fully aware of the fact that one of the major hurdles in its path toward regional pre-eminence is its Shia character. Much of the rest of the Middle East is predominantly Sunni Muslim. This was a major, if not the primary, reason that Iran’s post-revolution leaders emphasized the “Islamic” rather than the Shia nature of the Iranian revolution, thus enhancing its appeal among the Sunni majority in the Middle East.
Iran’s support to Muslim causes — the Palestinian cause foremost among them — regardless of the sectarian composition of the affected Muslim populations has added greatly to the popularity of the Islamic Republic, particularly among the Arab public.
Al-Maliki’s sectarian policy is bound to hurt not only Iraqi interests, but also the image of Iran in the Middle East, and adversely affect its ambitions to act as a major player in the region, especially since Iran is perceived as the principal supporter of the al-Maliki government.
It is, therefore, in Iran’s interest to rein in al-Maliki’s sectarian proclivities and to maneuver to have him replaced as Iraq’s leader if he is not amenable to Tehran’s advice. Muqtada al-Sadr can be used by Iran to pull the rug from under al-Maliki’s feet, since al-Maliki is now dependent upon the 40-member Sadrist group in Parliament to keep him in office. (The Iraqiya — the coalition of Sunni and secular Shia groups to which al-Hashimi belongs — withdrew its support from the governing coalition.) That the Sadrists, one of the three main Shia groups in the Iraqi Parliament, may be contemplating such a move themselves is indicated by their demand on Monday that Parliament be dissolved and new elections held.
The Sadrist agenda may, in fact, coincide better with the Iranian one, given al-Sadr’s visceral anti-Americanism, which stands in sharp contrast to al-Maliki’s ambivalence toward the United States. But regardless of this fact, it is becoming increasingly evident that al-Maliki’s current policy runs contrary to Iran’s interests. It is also clear that only Iran is in a position to force him to reverse course and thus to save Iraq from disintegration and civil war.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Mohammed Ayoob.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
LIAM BARTLETT: In a luxury hotel room, we carefully set our trap “ with the help of experienced fraud investigators. Our targets lurk in the street below “ Nigerian conmen awaiting the call from another victim. But this time the call will come from us and undercover police are ready to pounce.
DAMIEN: No more mucking around “ you want your money, come up. I’ll give it to you, you can go. These greedy scammers are slicker than ever. To better hide their tracks they’ve spread from Nigeria to become a global pandemic.
BRIAN: They’re intelligent, they’re resourceful, they’ve got global networks and let’s face it “ at this point in time, they’re winning the battle.
LIAM BARTLETT: Here in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, our chance to strike back.
DAMIEN: That’s when you and the police come in.
LIAM BARTLETT: On behalf of the 10,000 Australians who, despite all the publicity, still hand over a total of $10 million to these shysters every single month.
DAMIEN: You count¦
LIAM: Good afternoon, we’re from 60 Minutes Australia and you seem to be in a lot of trouble.
JULIA: Well. They’re the lowest of the low. They’re absolute scumbags and they are a poor excuse for a conman.
LIAM BARTLETT: When we first exposed Nigerian scammers in Lagos six years ago, they ran a simple but lucrative operation “ sending dodgy emails around the world requesting money, with the lure of a handsome return.
POLICE: Sit down! Sit down!
LIAM BARTLETT: But the swindlers have a new schtick. They’ve moved onto dating sites and the cruel hook they use is the promise of love.
ROSALIE: I suppose he absolutely had me by my heart. This guy was just telling me everything that I wanted to know.
LIAM BARTLETT: He was saying everything he knew you wanted to hear.
ROSALIE: Everything I wanted to hear, yep. He was making me feel as if I was worth a person.
LIAM BARTLETT: Rosalie is 53 “ divorced and terribly lonely. For romance scammers, the perfect mark. Looking for love online, she met Benjamin Walthol “ a handsome, American businessman, working in Malaysia. Ben wooed her for hours at a time “ he even sent flowers. Rosalie believed she’d finally found true love. And when the man of her dreams asked for loans to help his business, she happily handed over thousands.
ROSALIE: $90,000 plus what I still owe in phone calls and I have a debt of fifteen thousand dollars.
LIAM BARTLETT: You’ve given away your entire life savings and you’re in debt?
ROSALIE: Yes.
LIAM BARTLETT: But even now, Rosalie clings to the dream that Ben will repay the loans and they’ll begin a new life together as he promised. Her brother Neville knows better.
NEVILLE: The whole family has been banging their heads against a brick wall. It’s very difficult.
LIAM BARTLETT: At the risk of breaking his sister’s heart, Neville has sought professional intervention to expose the truth.
JULIA: Look, Neville brought us here because we have some serious concerns about the man you’ve met online and that he’s not the person he claims to be.
LIAM BARTLETT: Julia Robson is a new breed of the investigator. She runs DateScreen, conducting background checks for people who’ve met on dating sites “ and business is booming
JULIA: The golden rule is if you’ve met them online and they ask for money, it is a scam.
LIAM BARTLETT: Julia has followed Rosalie’s money trail to Malaysia and noticed references to a man called Bidemi Bakare.
JULIA: Bidemi, his name came up on documents that Rosalie was sending via Western Union. His name was written on the documents as collecting it, so straight away we had a suspect in mind
LIAM BARTLETT: And sure enough Rosalie’s white, middle-aged Lothario, Benjamin Walthol, is a fake. This is the man who’s really been romancing her “ Bidemi Bakare. His Facebook page reveals a champagne lifestyle in Kuala Lumpur, funded by the money he’s swindled from Rosalie and countless other women.
JULIA: We’ll find him. We’ll track him down and we’ll prove to you that this person you thought was Benjamin Walthol is really Bidemi.
BIDEMI: I miss you, I’ve been thinking about you long.
JULIA: Oh I know, I can hardly sleep
LIAM BARTLETT: And so in Kuala Lumpur, we set out to take on this swindler at his own game. Julia poses on a dating site as Amber “ and befriends Benjamin.
BIDEMI: I’m thinking baby, I’m thinking if you can send some round figure of say $20,000 so I can have some pocket money on me, you know.
LIAM BARTLETT: You did exactly what he does. Created another identity and targeted him
JULIA: That’s exactly it.
LIAM BARTLETT: And sure enough, Bidemi comes sniffing for the easy cash “ $23,000 that Amber has promised will be delivered by a business associate. Former Victorian undercover cop, Damien Marratt, is playing our middleman.
DAMIAN: We bought in the ruse that she had a friend, Jack “ myself “ who often travels through Singapore and Asia on business and basically I could deliver the money personally.
LIAM BARTLETT: We’ve wired the room with microphones and hidden cameras. It’s one thing to get Bidemi to the room but for a conviction, we need the money shot “ the moment he accepts the cash.
DAMIAN: We’ll have a quick chat to him, show him the money, get everything we need on tape just to show he’s involved in the scam and yeah, that’s when you and the police come in.
LIAM BARTLETT: In an adjacent room, we wait with surveillance gear, Julia, and a posse of Malaysia’s finest detectives. Out on the street, undercover police surround the hotel.
DAMIAN: Sorry mate, $23,000. I don’t know about money here, but $23,000 is a lot of money.
LIAM BARTLETT: But after repeated phone calls, we fear Bidemi is getting cold feet. Then finally, a knock on the door…
DAMIAN: I’m Jack “ So who have I been talking to? Sit down ..
LIAM BARTLETT: ¦ but it’s not our man. The crafty conman Bidemi has sent a local teenager to collect the cash.
DAMIAN: That is three ¦you counts to make sure.
LIAM BARTLETT: Hi, good afternoon “ we’re from 60 Minutes Australia’ and you seem to be in a lot of trouble. It’s a bust, but not our target. We want Bidemi
DAMIAN: Ben if you want your money no more mucking around. If you want your money comes up. I’ll give it to you, you can go…
LIAM BARTLETT: So, we take a gamble. We let the courier go, knowing he may run. But our hope is he’ll lead us right to our main man. And yes “ in the streets around the hotel, the undercover police swoop. Bidemi and five accomplices “ nabbed. Do you know Rosalie?
BIDEMI: I don’t, sir.
LIAM BARTLETT: You don’t know, Rosalie. What have you done with the $53,000 she gave you?
JULIA: You are the lowest form of a conman that I have ever met. The woman that I’ve spoken to “ the pain and the destruction of their family you have caused from this stupid little trick. All of you, look at you “ you’re absolutely disgusting. The stories I’ve heard “ I have no sympathy for these people. None whatsoever.
BIDEMI: She says she thinks I’m Benjamin.
LIAM: Yes, because you called yourself Benjamin’.
BIDEMI: Yeah, I know.
JULIA: Now the moment of truth “ proving Bidemi is Rosalie’s online lover, Benjamin. And guess who’s number we find on his phone.
LIAM BARTLETT: Oh, what a surprise! Hello is that Rosalie? We’re standing in a hotel in Kuala Lumpur at the moment and I’ve got a fellow standing next to me wearing a set of handcuffs. He just wants to say a few words, see if you can recognise this voice. Can you just talk to him for a moment?
BIDEMI: Hello?
LIAM BARTLETT: Don’t be shy, tell them what name you’re using now.
BIDEMI: Benjamin. Benjamin Walthol.
LIAM BARTLETT: Unbelievably, we found the numbers of another 81 Australian women on Bidemi’s mobile. That list is being investigated by Australian authorities. So you’re halfway through that list and so far it’s almost 100% strike rate?
BRIAN: Yes.
LIAM BARTLETT: On the victims.
BRIAN: Yes.
LIAM BARTLETT: He was a busy boy, wasn’t he?
BRIAN: Well he was very successful until you people came along.
LIAM BARTLETT: Brian Hay’s job, as head of the Queensland Fraud Squad, is to catch the scammers. But he spends more time counselling their targets.
BRIAN: You’re not victims, you’re survivors. You’ve gone through it, you’ve come out the other end and you’re not letting the bastards get it from you anymore.
LIAM BARTLETT: In Brisbane police headquarters, a support group for women “ and men “ who’ve been stung by Nigerians.
WOMAN #1: I willingly parted with $300,000.
MAN: You get sucked in and you find out when it’s too late and it’s cost you money.
WOMAN #2: He talked to me for quite a while, madly in love with me, never seen me before but madly in love with me. And wanted to make my life good.
BRIAN: For these people, it is love. They believe it, they live it, they breathe it, they yearn for it and to them, it’s very real, very tangible.
POLICEMAN: They’re sending the money to Nigeria.
LIAM BARTLETT: Meanwhile, back at Bidemi’s place, we’re following the paper trail. Most of those ill-gotten gains are sent straight back to Nigeria into the hands of criminal gangs and even terrorist groups. But men like Bidemi cream enough of the profit to keep themselves in the best of bling.
LIAM BARTLETT: Where does a student get $800 for a pair of designer label sneakers?
BIDEMI: My mum, she sent pocket money.
LIAM: Your mum sent you pocket money?
BIDEMI: Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: From Nigeria?
BIDEMI: Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: You got the most generous mother in the world have you? Gee. $800 for sneakers. There’ll be no Louis Vuitton where Bidemi and his fellow conmen are headed “ Malaysian prison and then deportation back to Nigeria.
ROSALIE: I don’t hate him I just feel sorry for him. I don’t know how that a person could do that to someone who’s just trying to help and that’s all I wanted was to help him to get out of Malaysia and he promised me absolutely a new life.
JULIA: These people are in a place in their life where they are lonely, they are looking for love, something…
LIAM BARTLETT: Does that make them silly?
JULIA: No, it doesn’t make them silly. There’s nothing wrong with having friendships and falling in love with someone online. That’s not the issue.
LIAM BARTLETT: The danger arises when that love is blind “ Rosalie’s desperate heart made her ignore all the warnings. Even, after all, we’d told her, Rosalie had been back at the computer being wooed by a new man calling himself Richard’. Rosalie, while we’ve been having this interview, we’ve checked out Richard Williams’ email and guess what? It’s on a blacklist. He’s a scammer too. He’s not who he says he is and he certainly doesn’t love you as he’s professing.
ROSALIE: Really? You’ve actually checked out that email address as…
LIAM BARTLETT: While we’ve been talking. Rosalie, please turn the computer off, Rosalie. Just please turn the computer off. If you can’t see the whites of their eyes and they’re not buying you a drink. Don’t talk to them.
ROSALIE: No one buys me a drink. That’s the whole problem.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
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