Man accused of cheating 60 students out of N15 million for school fees

A student from a university in Delta State, South-south Nigeria, Jeremia Elele, is accused of cheating around 60 new students out of N15 million.

The police spokesperson in Delta State, Bright Edafe, shared a video on his X handle on Friday. He said Mr Elele collected money from victims to help them pay their tuition fees.

Mr Edafe, a superintendent of police, explained that the students gave the suspect between N250,000 and N300,000 each for their tuition.

Reports say Mr Elele and many of the victims got admission through the Joint Universities Preliminary Examinations Board (JUPEB).

JUPEB is a 10-month advanced-level program. It helps candidates gain Direct Entry admission into the 200 level of a university without taking the usual Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination.

During questioning, Mr Elele admitted in the video that he took money from the students but did not pay their school fees as promised.

However, he argued that he collected money from 31 students, not 60. The 28-year-old said he bought between 11 and 15 dogs with the money and sold them later.

He mentioned that he “misused” the leftover funds while trying to pay back the victims. Mr Edafe asked him why he did this, but interrupted him when he tried to say he had no intention to cheat the students.

“This your story can’t work for me,” the police spokesperson said, reminding him that the victims were present at the police station.

“You collected from people’s school fees and you did not pay,” he told Mr Elele. “Yes Sir,” the suspect replied.

When questioned, the suspect admitted that he paid his own school fees. “This is what we call man’s inhumanity to man,” Mr Edafe said about what the suspect did.

Mr Edafe then brought in some victims to share their stories. The video did not show their faces.

One victim, who did not give his name, said he met Mr Elele during the JUPEB program. He started to trust him when the suspect helped him pay for attendance through the university’s software.

“I trusted him with my school fees of N210,000 because he claimed he could pay it and that he was working with the school.

“He said he signed as a surety with the school for students paying him so they could pay half first and the rest later,” the victim explained.

Four other victims shared that they each gave Mr Elele N256,000 for their tuition fees, which he also failed to pay.