Former Women’s Action for Development (WAD) executive director Veronica de Klerk and international donors were forced to change accommodation for fear of being robbed or kidnapped by scammers.
De Klerk, who was accompanied by donors from Sweden and non-governmental organisation representatives from South Africa, said she almost fell victim to scammers who used land reform minister Utoni Nujoma’s name to locate her and her guests.
“I am a very well-known person, so I don’t know if they wanted to kidnap me and then ask for ransom for my release, or rob my guests and me,” De Klerk said.
The activist was at a meeting at the WAD head office when someone called the office and left a message with the receptionist that Nujoma is urgently looking for her.
“The caller left a number, which belonged to the minister. I kept trying to call the number, but couldn’t get through. So, I decided to call the personal assistant to inform the minister that I received his message, and was now available,” De Klerk explained.
The minister’s assistant was, according to her, not aware of him looking for her, but took the message anyway.
She then received a phone call shortly afterwards from a man only identifying himself as a police constable.
The alleged ‘officer’ told her that the minister had made a “severe” case against her, and she must tell them where she is, or meet them at the Windhoek Police Station.
“I told him that I am clean as far as Namibia is concerned, so this sounded like a scam,” she added.
The activist said although she had her reservations and suspicions, she ended up telling the man where she was staying.
In the meantime, she got hold of police deputy commissioner Abner Agas, who told her that there was no case against her and that she needs to be very careful.
She added that they were forced to move from where they were staying at another hotel because the men had sent her text messages that they are outside her accommodation.
“They sent me three text messages. Pick up, hier [here] and kyk buite [look outside]”.
“It was scary. I almost got a heart attack because I now knew they knew where I was,” she said.
She added that while she did not open a case, she wanted to alert the nation to be careful, and not fall prey to criminals.
De Klerk said she was also disappointed that her guests had to go through this experience, and could potentially be discouraged from making donations to worthy causes in the country.
Agas confirmed the incident and said that they are becoming a common occurrence.
“What I told the madam is that these are crooks. They use prominent people’s names to threaten innocent and unsuspecting people or rob them. The minister never opened a case against her,” Agas told yesterday.
“These are criminals trying to crook people. The public must be cautious,” he said adding that they are tracing the numbers used to call De Klerk.
Police spokesperson chief inspector Kauna Shikwambi on Sunday told that “it is becoming very prevalent for people to use the names of ministers, lawyers, business people and even that of Inspector General Sebastian Ndeitunga to commit crimes.”
“Society needs to be very careful and verify when they get suspicious phone calls and requests to meet some people,” Shikwambi stated.
When tried to call the number on Sunday, a man answered the call, and when asked about the incident, he said, “don’t call me from the Namibian Police. I will not waste my time with Nampol”. He ended the phone call and was not reachable afterwards.
Police have on several occasions warned the public against different scams.
In 2015, The Namibian reported on scammers who tried to defraud farmers by pretending to be police officials who had found stolen livestock from a specific farm and demanded payment of between N$10 000 and N$120 000 from the owner before the livestock could be returned.
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