(Njogu wa Njeri is a columnist and a trained journalist)
In the past couple of years, Kenyans have been turned into spectators of grand schemes that swindle members of the public millions their hard-earned cash courtesy of investors-turned-fraudsters.
Perhaps, most Kenyans have nothing to learn from the saying, “once beaten twice shy” as they seem to willingly offer themselves as sacrificial lambs to other fraudsters.
The fraudsters who are loyal members of the ‘conman club’ disguise as investors who are out and about to ‘strategically invest’ on their behalf.
However, Kenyans are too lazy to conduct due diligence, an attribute that fraudsters understand pretty well and capitalise on while scheming their next move to establish a ‘legal’ business vehicle to enrich themselves with people’s money.
The dust is yet to settle on the heated scam involving the televangelist turned politician and investor David Kariuki Ngare, popularly known as Gakuyo, the proprietor of Gakuyo Real Estate and Ekeza Sacco.
He is now at the centre of legal battles owing to the hundreds of millions of cash owed to the members of the troubled Sacco which cannot be accounted for now.
However, the fate of the Sacco was predictable, and the state of its dwindling fortunes was apparent long before it started nose-diving.
Its superfluous growth, massive campaigns backed by the absence of relevant structures to support its growth was a recipe for disaster.
It was just another grand pyramid scheme aimed at dwarfing other schemes such as DECI, Pesanet, Mont Blanq Afrique among others.
The most peculiar factor that stands out and is common in all these schemes is the unreasonable promise to enrich its members very fast with business strategies that are economically unsound.
Even with prima facie evidence, one can smell their dreadful failure right from the start. More pyramid schemes are yet to be exposed but the fraudsters behind such entities are busy defrauding Kenyans of their money even at this moment.
This calls for the members of the public to exercise extra caution and do due diligence before investing any money in such business ventures – even the ones that ostensibly claim to be the leading in the industry.
Lately, such schemes that defraud Kenyans of their money are spread across real estate companies, microfinance institutions, cryptocurrency and other pseudo-economic ventures that are established to peacefully rob people then disappear faster than they even appear.
Conduct due diligence before you entrust your penny to someone who pops up and claims to multiply it on your behalf but was nowhere to be seen as you worked indefatigably to earn it.
#hivisasaoriginal