Wanted Man: The Curious Case of EFCC and Francis Uju Adoms
If you depend on Google like many people do, you would be made to believe that Dr. Francis Uju Adoms had disappeared into thin air, seeing as he was declared wanted by Interpol — thanks to the effort of Chive GPS and others. But whilst some depend solely on the internet for their research, others go the extra mile. In this case, the extra mile yielded benefits. We learnt that Francis Uju Adoms is very much alive and kicking in Nigeria and continues to live the life of luxury that he was used to before he was declared wanted. More importantly, the search led us to questions on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission — the EFCC — and its means and ways.
The EFCC, its mode of operation and the appurtenances of its means and ways, never really came to the fore until one’s effort to gain more light on another issue led to the case of Francis Uju Adoms. If you do not know who Dr. Francis Uju Adoms is, you should. Fewer Nigerians have gotten away with the size of crime he was declared wanted for. By some estimates, using his company Addy Finance and Investment Ltd AddyFX, he is alleged to have scammed unsuspecting Nigerians of about N43b- most likely more — in context, almost half the budget of Ekiti and Plateau states in 2022. It would have been just another scam story until you realise this one has taken at least one life and has cost people their livelihoods.
Adoms is not on the run anymore and has not been for a while. He is allegedly being prosecuted by the EFCC and is shockingly enjoying bail. This would be a normal piece of news until you see that, nothing about his relationship with the EFCC is anywhere normal. It appears to be an effort in secrecy. Except we are going to be told this person has allegations bordering on espionage and terrorism, in which case he wouldn’t be the guest of the EFCC, there is no reason why this prosecution and everything around it appears to be done under the table.
A text message sent to the named EFCC IPO on the matter was delivered but met with no response. A call was put through, the phone connected, no response either. The most curious thing about EFCC and Adoms — could be EFCC versus Adoms — is that there are several tweets mentioning @OfficialEFCC on Twitter to get on his alleged criminal activities. Against its usual style of posting tweets and photos of suspects — especially cyberfraudsters and million-naira level criminals — the EFCC appears loudly and decidedly quiet on Adoms.
There is no report about the case on their site, something they would usually do in most cases. You would think a deal was reached by some parties to keep the matter out of the media. Or is the EFCC beginning a born-again phase where they no longer use the media in their arrest and prosecution process? If that is the case, I guess Adoms is quite lucky to be the first beneficiary of such a curious largesse.
This cannot be the case though. For a man alleged to have defrauded several thousands of people, they deserve to know that their government is finally helping them to pursue justice. They deserve to know that there would be no hanky-panky. They deserve to have their fears, induced by the thinking that, someone who has been alleged to have stolen enough money to massively fund a state’s budget could have enough to bribe his way out of justice. One would trust that the EFCC is above such fears, but how do we verify if the EFCC at this point never mentioned that it had finally apprehended Adoms? Especially an alleged criminal that was already declared wanted by another crime control organization. I believe the EFCC Chairman, Abdulrasheed Bawa, is not aware of this case. No way he is and the case is being played with such suspicion.
If you asked Francis Uju Adoms — or whatever name he answers now — whether he has ever committed murder, he’d most likely answer in the negative. I wonder if the fact at least one of his alleged AddyFX victims committed suicide is close to that. My email is replete with people who have been scammed by yet another ‘investment company’, and the one thing the victims have in common is a sense of helplessness. In a country with laws and prisons, this should never be the case.
Adoms had a seemingly clean model and a big promise; claimed to trade in FOREX, real estate, appeared to have a training school for FOREX trading, and with offices in Egbeda, Ikeja, Lekki, Abuja, Makurdi, Port Harcourt, and Imo, Uju and his Addy Finance and Investment LTD had a clean run from 2019 to 2021.
You would expect that someone who allegedly raised over a billion dollars from investors would have the motivation to be legitimate — irrespective of his initial agenda. Where such persons fail to live up to the trust of their clients, the government steps in. We cannot just trust people to do and be better. Without preventive measures and effective punishments for crimes such as these, we’d likely see more Nigerians lose more money to future criminals. That Ponzi schemes continue to thrive cannot just be put to the greed of the people. By design, humans will be humans. That’s the essence of government, to check our worse instincts, to protect us from one another and to ensure those who prove themselves unworthy of basic human rights are jailed appropriately and seen to be.
Ungoverned spaces allow for banditry to thrive. We have investment bandits defrauding families and killing people quietly. In the case of Francis Uju Adoms, credit to the EFCC for finally apprehending the wanted alleged criminal. They certainly deserve a lot more credit when they let Nigerians, especially his alleged victims, know that the wanted alleged criminal is being prosecuted. Here, I am simply asking the EFCC to do what it normally does. Some of us continue to retain our trust in the good of the EFCC, an organisation that has, to a large extent, been the pride of our country.
© Joshua J. Omojuwa
