Adeyemi Okediran
On Tuesday, November 30, 2021, a Twitter blog page, Postsubman is known for posting and updating his followers on the latest happenings and entertainment tweeted a graphics with quote the tweet, “EFCC nets 60 at ‘Yahoo Boys’ awards night.’”
The graphic consists of an image of young boys sitting on the floor inside a room with armed men in EFCC uniforms standing at a corner of the room.
As of the time of fact-checking this claim, the tweet has generated 16 comments from different handles, 19 quotes and retweets, and 44 likes.
CLAIM
N-VA extracted the claim, “EFCC Arrests 60 Suspects at ‘Yahoo Boys Awards Night’ in Ogun” and went on to fact-check and verify its authenticity.
POTENTIAL IMPACT OF THE CLAIM
Recently, there has been high reportage on cybercriminals popularly known as Yahoo boys being arrested and arraigned by the officers of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on a daily basis on various media platforms.
What prompted this fact-checking was the fact that it was reported in the graphics been posted that the Yahoo Boys organized a program tagged: “Peer Youths Awards,” to reward themselves for engaging in cyber fraud.
VERIFICATION
According to a News Story published by The Cable on November 29, 2021, it was reported that operatives of the Lagos Command of the EFCC have arrested 60 suspected internet fraudsters during an awards ceremony at the Conference Hotel in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
The statement read in full: The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) says its operatives have arrested 60 persons at an award event organized to “reward internet fraudsters”.
According to a statement issued on Monday by the spokesman of EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren, the 60 persons were arrested during the event held at the Conference Hotel in Abeokuta, Ogun state.
The commission said several items, including cars and mobile phones, were recovered from the suspects, adding that they would soon be charged to court.
The statement reads: “Operatives of the Lagos Command of the EFCC have arrested 60 suspected internet fraudsters during an awards ceremony at the Conference Hotel in Abeokuta, Ogun State,” the statement reads.
“The event tagged “Peer Youths Awards”, an investigation revealed, was organized to reward high-level internet fraudsters. Items recovered from the suspects at the point of arrest include exotic cars, electronic devices, laptop computers, and mobile phones. The suspects will soon be charged to court.”
It was also discovered that various media outlets have published the same news story like This Day, Leadership, Instablog9ja, and other blog websites.
However, a Twitter user with the pseudo name ABIJA WARA bi SMOOCHEY has nullified the claim while quote tweeting the initial tweet posted by Postsubman.
He tweeted that “Nothing of such happened in Abeokuta over the weekend. A party was hosted at conference hotel. Whosoever started this “yahoo boys” award night agenda did very bad because that was a false information. Fraudsters were around the hotel but no party was oragnaised by them. Nawa oooo”
To clarify if there was misinformation in the news articles which has been shared by several verified news platforms, the researcher put a call and text across to Conference Hotel.
After several calls which went unanswered, the manager of the Conference Hotel who identified himself as Mr Idris replied to the several WhatsApp messages left by the researcher, stating that the yahoo boys were not in the hotel premises to attend the award ceremony.
In his reply, Idris stated that the Yahoo Boys were in the hotel to enjoy themselves and not for the award programme.
CONCLUSION
The claim that “EFCC Arrests 60 Suspects at ‘Yahoo Boys Awards Night’ in Ogun” is FALSE as the award ceremony event which happened in the said hotel wasn’t organized by the yahoo boys as earlier stated by the EFCC spokesman in his statement.
