Subscribers of the duplicitous Mavrodi Mondial Moneybox in Nigeria have started counting days to the return of one of the world's most popular and litigious Ponzi Schemes associated with a daring Russian criminal, Sergey Mavrodi.

If the incessant press releases credited to Sergey Mavrodi are to believed to be from him as projected, MMM will unfreeze the accounts of its community members on the 14th of January, 2017 and financial activities will commence again just like last year.

 

The return of MMM is more disturbing than the news of the looming doom in Kaduna State in reference to the episodic Shia Muslims crises and holocaust in Southern Kaduna as perpetrated by the faceless Fulani herdsmen with President Muhammadu Buhari and Governor Nasir El Rufai napping over a ticking time-bomb.

Their actions and inactions are not dissimilar to that of successive administrations which were corruptly distracted from state duties thereby allowing the Boko Haram sect to burgeon in the year 2002 into one of the most dreaded terrorist groups in the world today.

 

In as much as concerned and foresighted Nigerians appreciate the public condemnations, orientation and re-orientation of Nigerians by top financial bodies and government institutions like the Central Bank of Nigeria, Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation, The Securities and Exchange Commission of Nigeria, House of Representatives, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Nigeria Police Force, commercial banks, the media  and others, - the Nigerian Government led by President Buhari could still be accused of not exploiting enough measures to protect its vulnerable citizens. 

Why is the Federal Government stalling in cutting local access to the MMM Nigeria website to protect Nigerians who have been exposed by the incapability of the current administration to manage the excruciating hardship of the present economic recession?

 

Buhari has again failed to exercise his prerogative as the First Man of Nigeria by ordering Internet Service Providers to block money-doubling sites, affiliates and anybody that provides MMM Virtual Private Network, VPN centers. This is comparable to an emergency action taken by the Chinese government to eradicate the so-called Mutual Beneficiary Network from the country in January, 2016.

 

MMM targets mostly third world countries where poverty is prominent. It’s an intelligently devised scheme to exploit the endemic greed in human beings. One has to admit that it takes utmost self-discipline, intellectual capability, exposure, fear and grace of God not to take membership with the community due to the high rate of under-employment, unemployment, inflation, poor remuneration, insolvency of state governments and other economic anomalies being faced in Nigeria as against the mouth-watering 30% return on investments provided by the scheme. But again, is money ever enough? The truthful answer is NO! 

 

Nigeria is historically plagued with a seeming cultural retrogressive approach to stringent issues that require national focus. The discord between the Federal Government and its people is one of the major challenges of successive administrations. One wonders why a fictitious financial body with no visible office building and original workers operating without registering or obtaining certification from the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC as required by law is allowed to dominantly strive for over a year even in the face of its fallible historical antecedence.

 

Nigeria has a backward trend that unsettles any sane mind. I am talking about the culture of 'excessive talks and zero action'. We are very good at analyzing issues at every section of the media; Buhari joins us in distracting public attention with non-committal press statements regarding biting issues in the polity with little or no sincere political will to attend to them.

The issue remains the same until the challenge escalates and becomes a part of us just like the Boko Haram sect today.

 

One wonders how an amateur militia formed by mostly illiterates who couldn't read and write nor speak English language developed into a full blown terrorist group under well-funded security agencies in Nigeria like the Nigeria Police Force, Department of State Security, Nigerian Army, Nigerian Custom Service, Nigerian Immigration Service, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, National Intelligence Agency and others. What happened to the act of intelligence gathering and under-cover investigations to nip developing threats in the bud as it’s been done in the Global North? 

 

We enjoy watching till the 11th hour when they can amass weapons massive enough to turn our gallant soldiers to 'soft targets', displace over 2 million people, kidnap over 200 Chibok school girls, maim thousands of Nigerians with capricious terrorist operations and kill over 20,000 Nigerians within a space of 8 years; That's how it is in the acclaimed giant of Africa. 

 

If MMM Nigeria becomes operational again on the 14th of January, 2017 as planned under the nose of Buhari, then Nigeria has just birthed another national disaster in the financial sector.

MMM has been described as a social network that offers aids to members but the truth is that the Wonder Bank isn't a charity organization. It’s a business initiative by three tax-evading Russians who failed in other businesses and finally resigned to living on the pains of others.

 

MMM is not an escape route from economic recession. This was the erroneous belief of people during the Soviet Union era of economic downturn in the 1990s till the fingers of 5 to 40 million investors were burned and at least 50 people committed suicide after losing their life savings. An estimate of $10 billion was tragically lost.

 

Mavrodi in his superior knowledge as a Mathematician and Computer Programmer boasted during an interview that MMM would always sell and strive as long as greed and the quest for money is a part of human beings.

MMM is not an investment, its a costly gamble that redistributes the wealth of the majority among the fortunate minority. It compounds the menace of poverty and depression.

 

MMM has a history of manipulating the indignation of the downtrodden people against the government of the day. This was evident in the 90's when Mavrodi used his teeming subscribers to get elected into the Russian State Duma, an equivalent of the parliament while in prison. His goal was to escape the consequences of his offences through immunity attached to the public office.

 

MMM is too fragile to be trusted and banked on especially during these days of hard money. The Pyramid Scheme was exposed by the Yuletide as Nigerians in the hysteria of the moment would typically expend their savings to enjoy the Christmas and New Year celebrations. Since it’s a system that survives on funds channeled in by new members who will certainly not be investing during the Yuletide, there was a need to go on a 'Mannequin Challenge' mode to prevent it from crashing.

 

One wonders if the Nigerian government embodied with the primary responsibility of protecting its citizens and defending their interests both home and abroad has a sense of history. MMM successfully kept its Zimbabwean subscribers in bondage with its banal mode of operation. In the month of September 2016, MMM Global Zimbabwe issued a freeze on all accounts; speculations suggest that it occurred due to a fall in number of participants. Specifically on the 5th of the same month, all MMM accounts were unfrozen and members were mandated to proceed with their financial transactions. However, the lifting of the embargo came with a smart Grinch by MMM to cage members who would have loved to opt out due to national panic. Members would incur a whooping 80% loss on their available funds should they decide to withdraw their funds. This apparently coerced some participants into leaving their funds in the system while others proceeded to endure the massive loss on their 'investments'. 

According to reports, this innovative act of modern slavery affected 66,000 Zimbabweans thereby worsening the already recessive local economy.

 

MMM was also a catalyst of very brief moments of happiness and long-term pains in other countries like Indonesia, Lesotho, South Africa and India.

 

President Buhari's wind of corruption should spread its coverage extensively from the political class to the private sector. The EFCC should swing into action to uncover the local propagators of MMM in the know. There are strong leads that MMM Global Nigeria is being controlled locally. There are rumours that one MMM top guider in Nigeria named Chuddy Anayo Ugorji who got married last year in grand style surreptitiously collaborated with international business partners in the Philippines and Dubai - United Arab Emirates to build the MMM community in Nigeria. 

 

According to social media surveillance reports on Chuddy's account, the MMM deal was purportedly struck at the Dubai Marina Yaught club with foreigners named Richard, Ritta (female) and Dmitry Dzim. Ritta has been described as a multi millionaire who bankrolled MMM Nigeria with its server in the Philippines.

 

Chuddy, a native of Imo State has reportedly raked over N1 to N5 billion naira in a year from the fraudulent scheme. His criminally-supportive wife, chiamaka Ugorji once confirmed in a social media post that her husband is the principal founder of the shambolic scheme in Nigeria when media reports linked a South Africa-based Nigerian Pastor named Ernest Chigozie Mbanefo with the scheme.

 

The unprofessional and poorly constructed press statements from the supposed stable of Mavrodi reeks of the hands of Nigerians. These words may sound cheap and empty but they could serve as viable leads for concrete investigations to unravel the crystal-clear fraud in MMM Nigeria operations.

 

MMM Nigeria has survived on the false and deceptive claim that the social network doesn't have a common purse/central account to aggregate funds like the conventional banks as individuals transact businesses on a blind note after being paired with others by an anonymous administrator. But people have also over-looked the possibility of the malicious guiders being the administrators, thereby giving them the vantage point to exploit people and enjoy the windfall when the crash scripted by them plays out.

 

The Holy Bible in the book of Ecclesiastes 8:1 (New International Version) says "When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, people's hearts are filled with schemes to do wrong"

The fact that MMM has stimulated the emergence of other Ponzi Schemes like Icharity, Ultimate Cycler, NNN, Zarfund, Givers Forum, Crowd Rising, Get Help Worldwide and others is a testament to the validity of that saying.

 

President Buhari is the true Shepherd of this country and Nigerians are his sheep just like the biblical parable by Jesus Christ. Whatever happens to us is on his head; the fate of over 3 million Nigerians is hanging in the balance subject to the machinations of MMM drivers.

 

A part of history will always record that against him for failing to be proactive and pragmatic about critical issues of this magnitude.

 

Osayimwen Osahon George

Associate writer and editor at Tori.ng