...wherein the trail would appear to have gone cold on Mrs. Kazeem, at least temporarily. I am currently getting the cyber-equivalent of "talk to the hand" from her -er, him. Whoever. Sadly, U.R.'s inbox sits silent and bereft of any further BlessFaith gold.

Well, sort of. Mrs. Kazeem isn't very talkative right now, but there's never been a shortage of these rotters roaming about the glorious Internet. I've been corresponding with about six or seven more thieves in the past couple of weeks. I'm still in the very early [i.e. not very funny] stages with all of them, but one fellow seems promising indeed for good comedy. He is also persistent, which suits my purpose well; the original email I got from him was dated August 20th, 2004. I didn't reply until January 19th of 2005. This eager little chap's name is "Dr. Innocent Obieze". I'm not going to bother reprinting the entire first email from him here, but generally speaking he claims that he used to work for something called ECOWAS, which seems to be in some way related to peace-keeping efforts in Sierra Leone. He also claims to need U.R.'s help moving 25 million U.S. dollars out of the country, using some sort of "over-invoice" scam. Oh yeah, and he says his brother used to be the Attorney General of Togo. I've been trying all weekend, and I can't even confirm that the Republic of Togo has ever HAD an "Attorney General". All you Togoese out there, represent! Gimme a shout out and set me straight on the structure of your country's judicial system! Anyway, I'm going to switch to narrating that little story for now. Here's the Reader's Digest Version of the Correspondence so far:

OFFICE OF THE CHAIRMAN
CONTRACT AWARDING COMMITTE
ECOWAS HEADQUARTERS LOME,
REPUBLIC OF TOGO.

Dear; Yes, he left this BLANK!!

Forgive my indignation if this message comes to you as
a surprise and if it might offend you without your
prior consent and writing through this channel.I am
Dr.INNOCENT OBIEZE.The Chairman, Contract Awarding
Committee of the ECONOMIC COMMUNITY OF WEST AFRICAN
STATES ( ECOWAS)with Headquarters in Lome,Togo.I got
your information in a business directory from the
Togolaise Chamber of Commerce and Industries when I
was searching for a reliable,honest and trustworthy
person to entrust this business with.I was divinely
inspired and motivated to pick your contact from the
many names and list in the directory.After discussing
my view with my colleagues,they were very much
satisfied and decided to contact you immediately for
this mutual business relationship.We wish to transfer
the sum of USD25.5,000,000.00(TWENTY-FIVE Million,Five
hundred United States Dollars only.)into your personal
or company`s bank account.This fund was a residue of
the over invoiced contract bills awarded by us for the
supply of hard/softwares,phamaceauticals/medical
items,light and heavy duty vehicles, apparels and
other administrative logistics etc for the ECOMOG in
Sierria-Leone and Liberia during the Peace Keeping
Projects.This DEAL was deliberately hatched out and
carefully protected with all concerned.As the Chairman
of CAC,I have the co-operation and mandate of the
Financial Director and the Secretary of the
Organisation.We arranged and over invoiced the
contract funds supplied by different companies from
differentcountries during the crisis.It was our
consensus to seek the assistance of a willing
foreigner to provide us with the facilities to
transfer this money out of West Africa.

...bla bla bla...

[This is the] reason why we needed
your assistance to provide an account that can sustain
this fund for safe keeping and our future investment
with your comprehensive advise,assistance and
partnership in your country.we have however agreed,as
the account owner in this deal to allow you 30% of the
entire sum as compensation, 65% will be held on trust
for us while 5% will be used to defray any incidental
charges and cost during the course of the
transaction.This transaction will be successfully
concluded within 7 days if you accord us your
unalloyed and due cooperation.You should provide the
followings...[ and on and on and on...]

Upon the receipt of this informations,the documents and
approval with the texts will be sent to you for
confirmaton and then forwarded to the organisation for
ratification and subsequent payment.As a practice of
all organised (sensitive)and conspired DEALS,we
solicit for your unreserved confidentiality and utmost
secret in this business.We hope to retire peacefully
and lead a honourable business life afterwards.

Dr.INNOCENT OBIEZE.

So, U.R. Forwunyne wrote back and asked for more details before providing "this informations", but there's a twist, one that may or may not be important later; I haven't decided yet. I've been corresponding with so many of these jokers over the last couple of weeks, I somehow got mixed up and sent TWO emails to Dr. Innocent, from TWO different baiting accounts. Dr. Innocent dutifully responded to BOTH inquiries(both responses were substantially similar)! Yet he makes no mention of this astonishing fact! I haven't decided yet whether I'm going to continue corresponding with this twit from BOTH accounts, just to see how long it takes him to figure out there can't be that many people named "Ulysses R. Forwunyne" in the entire world, and what are the chances you'd get emails from TWO OF THEM ON THE SAME DAY? I may very well do so, and (once he begins to wonder) ultimately try to convince him that they are, in fact, two entirely separate people. Watching him try to keep the story straight between each of the two U.R.'s might be kind of fun. Anyway, that brings us straightaway to Dr. Innocent's responses of January 21st, 2005, entitled "THE PROCESS THAT WILL OCCUR". A little cheeky, no?

Dear Ulysses R. Forwunyne,

Thanks for your maiden responce,i dont want you to
have a doubting mind,by saying that you may be
interesting in helping me.I want you to consider the
proposal as the way i consider you before forwarding
it to you bearing inmind that we will work out this
deal together with one spirit and truth like a family.

As you will see,this is an over invoiced supply fund
realized during the war in Liberia and Seara Leone,now
that the original contractors has been paid,the over
invoiced fund still remains awaiting claims in the
bank.I must tell you that i utilized my position as
the chairman ecowas contract awarding committes to
work out this deal but the law guiding all the workers
of ecowas stated that we as a civil servant working
under ecowas will not be allowed to operate a foreign
account,this is the main reason why i needed your
assistance over the transfer of this money bearing
inmind that you will not let me down once the fund
gets into your account.

For us to achieve this goal,you have to apply
officially to the ecowas processing unit for the
aproval of this contract fund on your behalf and to
back up your application i will proceed immediately to
the coperate affairs commission to register your
company aswell as paying a three years tax clearance
on your behalf at the revenue office,i will again back
date all this registration to match up as of the time
this contract was awarded,this is to give your company
a legal claims over this fund,and i will fax the
receipt of the registrations to you for record
purpose.

Once more,i want you to bear inmind that this proposal
is hundred percent risk free as far as i am consern
because i am the one that awarded all this contract
but all we have to pray for the aproval of the fund
into your name because your application will goes to a
different office which is the approval office,why i am
still in the contract dept.Once your application is
aprove,the paying bank will not waste time in
notifying you on how the fund will be wired into your
nominated account and i will definitely resign to meet
you up for the sharing and investment of this money
according to our agreement.

For our constant communication,reply back with your
telephone and fax number,aswell as your full name and
address to enable me secure the applications of claims
and forward it to you immediately because we had just
seven days to complete this transaction upon the
reception of your application.

Call me on 00228-918-07-12 once you receive this mail
for more details.

Best Regard,

Obieze.

- U.R. Forwunyne don't need no stinkin' Mrs. Jones

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