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ZAMBIAN DENIES DEFRAUDING RENOWN RALLY DRIVER SH170.8 MILLION
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Dutch Rally Driver Loses Ksh170 Million To Suspected Kenyan Gold Scammers
A Zambian national was at the weekend arrested and deported over claims he defrauded a Dutch man Sh170 million in a fake gold deal.
Bupe Chipando alias Elena was deported following his arrest by Transnational and Organised Crimes detectives from his house in Ruaka.
He was deported Sunday night after Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiangí signed his deportation order.
Police and immigration officials said they had investigated the matter and established Chipando was in the country illegally and engaging in criminal activities.
He was known among the fake gold dealers as chairman.
Police said he has been operating an international syndicate of fraudsters in Nairobi.
He was also involved in the printing of counterfeit currency in the city that he used to show his targets as a sign of being rich before he defrauded them.
Police say Chipando had been mentioned in several other investigations where foreigners have been defrauded of millions of shillings.
He had posed as a potential supplier of gold to the Dutch national and lured him to Nairobi where he showed him the fake one in a house in Lavington and promised to ship the same to his country.
The foreigner realised he had been conned after paying the Sh170 million downpayment and the gang behind the same was demanding more.
He reported the matter to police who took the action.
Police say they have dozens of cases of complaints from foreigners who say they had been conned by Kenyans pretending to be selling gold.
In efforts to address such incidents, the DCI had asked embassies in the country to join the fight against the vice by urging them to advise their nationals engaged in trade to follow procedures.
“We urge the Embassies (High Commissions) to advise their nationals coming in for business to be apprised of con business of gold going on in the country and first contact the Department of Mines and Geology for the procedure that pertains to buying and selling of gold and other precious metals,” the DCI said.
It has extended similar caution to Kenyans trading in the commodity to conduct proper due diligence and ascertain that the people they are dealing with are not fraudsters.
“The gold scam has now reached alarming levels as unsuspecting foreign nationals are being swindled large amounts of money by fraudsters.”
Police investigations show counterfeit banknotes remain the top form of fraud for the increasingly growing mobile money and bank agents in Kenya.
In June 2017 Central Bank of Kenya acknowledged the possibility of a transnational fake currency ring in Nairobi and the region.
CBK and other East African Community central banks held a joint meeting with the Eastern Africa Police Chiefs Cooperation Organisation in September 2016 to develop strategies for enhancing the fight against counterfeit crime.
The bank regulator had conducted a survey in 2017 that showed 97 per cent of fraud faced by the agents involved fake notes.
