Recently, a member of our Intel team came across an agricultural investment platform called Farm Profit via Instagram.
He reached out to them and feigned interest in investing. After extensive discussions with them, they sent him the legal document to sign before making payments, it was at that point he noticed several red flags.
First, the name on the document was SAMINITECH FARM PROFIT.
Doing a Google search for this name turned up a warning from NSIA Insurance Limited to stay away from the company.
Second, the document also contained an NBA seal and the name of the suppose lawyer that prepared it.
A closer inspection shows that the NBA Seal on the contract is forged and fake, Notice the Name and Year are pasted using a textbox, then the number by the side is basically 1-8.
Upon reaching out to a lawyer, we discovered that genuine seals also come with an SCN number. A search at https://nigerianbar.org.ng/find-lawyer turned up no results meaning the Lawyer doesn’t exist.
Another red flag in the document was the insurance cover they claimed to have through an insurance company called WESTgate INSURANCE AFRICA and the supposed CEO of Saminitech Farms. Below is a screenshot of the Agricultural Insurance Provisional Certificate included in the document.
A quick Google search turned up the website WESTgate Insurance Africa with the domain http://westgateinsuranceafrica.com, below is the WHOIS record
Notice that the domain is only 19 days old and the registrant is named Isaiah Omoni. Going back to our document we also see the CEO of Saminitech farms is named Engr Isaiah Omoni.
From the foregoing, we can deduce that the insurance company is fictitious and was created to help allay the fears of potential investors. Next, we decided to have a look at the Farm profits website listed on their Instagram page.
Our first stop was checking out the WHOIS details for the website, then we pivoted using the phone number listed in the tech contact section
A google search using this number reveals it was mentioned in a Facebook post by Samdiri Fishery Nig Ltd. on November 21, 2018.
archived 10 Apr 2021 12:41:13 UTC
The flyer above from the Facebook post showed that Samdiri Fishery Nig Ltd is just a subsidiary of Samdiri Integrated Farms Nig Ltd. Also, the phone number 08182721275 belongs to 2Star Technology, the developers who made the Farm profit website. From the flyer, we can see these two entities have had a partnership dating back to 2018. The obvious question now was is it the same person behind Samdiri Integrated Farms Nig Ltd that is also behind SAMINITECH FARM PROFIT? Both being associated with 2Star Technologies showed a connection but we needed something stronger. So we went over to the Samdiri Integrated Farms Nig Ltd Facebook page, where we found the flyer below and reached out to one of the numbers listed via Whatsapp
As usual, we pretended as someone who wanted to invest and found out that Samdiri Integrated Farms Nig Ltd claimed to use the same fictitious Insurance company, WESTgate INSURANCE AFRICA as SAMINITECH FARM PROFIT, see screenshots of the chats below
From this, we can conclude that it is the same people that run SAMINITECH FARM PROFIT, Samdiri Integrated Farms Nig Ltd, Samdiri Fishery Nig Ltd, and WESTgate INSURANCE AFRICA. Our advice is not to conduct any business with the above-named entities as their outright use of deception is a clear sign of malevolent intentions.
Finally, if you’re looking to invest in an agricultural scheme or agric-tech platform, make sure you do your due diligence by researching everything about them. Also, you should consult an independent advisor or broker for guidance. Note that when an agric-tech platform says they are insured, make sure you find out what that insurance covers. Often times it means that they are insured against specified risks and not on an individual’s investor’s funds and returns.
6 Responses
Thanks for taking out the time to do all this research and findings. GOD BLESS YOU. Sorry for anyone who goes into biz without looking for info these days. As a matter of fact, I contacted them and asked for address of their facility. I searched on google maps and nothing turns up. These guys are SCAM!!
I have been scammed by this company, what is the way out . Can I get them through the bank account I transferred money into . I need your urgent advice
Hello Kabiru. We advise that you go and report the matter to the police. Then get a court affidavit, and proceed with both documents to your bank and report that the transaction was fraudulent and that you will like your money to be recovered. Your bank should be able to proceed from there.
Thank you for this message, I have also been scammed by this guy but the fact is he paid me Returns in the first month
Thanks for this. I was about to invest but decided to do a research.
I am about to invest too o
So how can get the real ones