How I was conned tens of millions

Former Garsen MP Danson Mungatana has opened up about the con scheme that saw him lose millions of shillings to fraudsters.

“About eight years ago, I lost a lot of money in a fake investment oil scheme that was run by Abdalla Tamba. He [was] later freed in Kenya, which I came to learn when I saw him on TV,” he said.

“After the police displayed him in public, I submitted myself as they had asked if anyone who had been conned to report to them.” Mungatana explained the business cost him a lot of money together with other prominent individuals.

“Abdalla and his partner came and told me to invest money so we would buy oil. The first and second round there was profit, but the third round, the foreigners simply disappeared and went with the money till recently when I saw him arrested. The suspects were arrested on September 28 2018,” said Mr Mungatana.

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Mr Mungatana dismissed reports doing rounds on social media that he was conned by a witchdoctor who promised to multiply his money to make him an overnight billionaire. “I did not want to be an overnight billionaire as claimed. That is not what my mother taught me. I have been working hard all my life.”

He said he fell prey to an investment scheme which was created by foreigners in cohort with local prominent leaders.

“It was not only me who suffered but there were a lot of prominent people who fell prey to the scheme as it seemed genuine.”

He said the proprietors of the scheme involved in buying and selling of oil appealed to deep-pocketed Kenyans to invest with them on promise of getting huge profits in return.

“We received profit in the first and second rounds, but the third time the proprietors of the scheme disappeared with our money,” said the former assistant minister without revealing the amount he lost.

Reports appearing in a section of the media claim Mr Danson Mungatana was defrauded a whopping Sh. 76 million. Mr Mungatana though refused to state the exact amount he lost, but said it was a “huge amount of money.”

Foreigners identified as Abdoulaye Tamba, Abdalla Tamba — both Chad nationals and Anthony Mwangangi are already in police custody after the court ordered to have them detained for 15 days to allow the police complete the investigations.

The suspects were nabbed in a raid by detectives at a house on Brookside Drive, Westlands where they were found with Sh. 1 billion fake notes in dollar and Euro currencies.