A Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt has sentenced one Sata Owugha Clinton and Bolonmubofa Blessing Soroh to one-year imprisonment for impersonation.
Justice I.M. Sani of the Federal High Court convicted the duo for using the identity of the petitioner to enrol in the Federal Government’s N-POWER Social Welfare scheme.
They were arraigned by the Port Harcourt’s Zonal Office of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on a one-count charge bordering on impersonation under Section 22(3) (a) of the Cybercrimes Prohibition, Prevention Act 2015 and punishable under Section 22(4) of the same Act.
Clinton and Soroh were arrested for using the name and identity of Lovedy Chiamaka Uzor to enrol in the welfare scheme and in the process obtained the sum of N360,000 from the scheme.
They were able to open a bank account in the name of Uzor because she also applied for the scheme, but stopped her application mid-way, fearing that the scheme may be a scam.
A statement by the EFCC said the convicts capitalized on the petitioner’s inability to further the enrollment process and completed the enrolment processes in the victim’s name.
The commission said the victim got wind of their fraudulent activities when she contacted her bank and found out that the convicts were already receiving payments from the scheme in her name.
