The Nigerian Navy has arrested three members of a fraudulent recruitment syndicate engaging in an illegal recruitment scheme to dupe unsuspecting youths.
At the weekend, the suspects, Paul Agade Manyep, Anthony Ngbe Monjack and Samuel Enoch Zarmai, were handed over to the Nigerian Police for further investigation and prosecution.
Parading the suspects at Mogadishu Military Cantonment in Abuja, the commanding Officer Naval Based Unit, Commodore Segun Adebari said that the suspected ringleader of the syndicate, one Mr. Morris Okorobi Effiong based in Calabar, is still at large.
“The ringleader coordinates the fake training at Atu Primary School in Atimbo Calabar, Commodore Adebari said.
At the time of their arrest on 7th March 2013, the suspects were in possession of fake Nigerian Navy identity cards, photocopies of credentials belonging to several individuals, and mobile phones, Navy uniforms and accoutrements and a Mitsubishi Lancer car with registration number AZ 808LND. According to the Nigerian Navy, the suspects fell for a bait of N45,000, which they wanted to personally collect from an innocent citizen.
The bait followed a complaint from a victim, one Bulus Doje, who lost the sum of N150,000 to the syndicate in an unsuccessful recruitment deal. In a statement earlier in the month, the Nigerian Navy had cautioned the public on the fake recruitment exercise.
“The attention of the Nigerian Navy has been drawn to the existence of some syndicates claiming to be carrying out recruitment exercise on behalf of the Service,” a part of it read.
“The Navy wishes to inform members of the general public that it has not commissioned any group to carry out any recruitment on its behalf. The service has a standard procedure for its recruitment exercise.
It added that recently, the Nigerian Navy, through its own personnel, embarked on the first phase of its 2013 recruitment exercise nationwide, which was well-advertised in the print and electronic media and.
“The result of the exercise is yet to be released,” the statement clarified, urging members of the public to be “wary of these recruitment syndicates who are out to defraud unsuspecting young Nigerians.”
