Many Nigerians were thrown into panic on Tuesday, December 13, 2016 as the popular pyramid scheme, Mavrodi Mundial Moneybox, MMM, shared a confusing message on its website stating that it has frozen all confirmed Mavros, otherwise known as money due for withdrawal for one month.
Soon after the news that the platform had frozen all accounts from Tuesday, December 13, 2016, many Nigerians took to Twitter to express their feelings about the development, the reactions of others, the economy in recession, and so much more.
But the scheme’s number one guider, simply identified as Chuddy, has issued a sort of statement to calm the fears of MMM Nigeria investors explaining that the platform has not been shut down and attempting to blame the actions of the Nigerian government and media for the startling move.
“Hi Mavrodians, As we all must have seen in our PO of the news on Mavro frozen for a month. This isn’t the first of its kind. It happens when there are excess PANIC in the system,”he wrote on the MMM Nigeria website.
He added that the brief ban was also placed on Zimbabwe and after the duration it was lifted.
He revealed that the “idea is brought forward to calm the members down on intending threat the FG and Mass media has planned on the system.
“It doesn’t mean that there is no more money in the system because in my PO now as a guider, I have about 2million+ PH orders. And I know it would be like that in most Guiders PO too. So you see!!! Money to pay out the orders wouldn’t be a problem.
“But the Admins needed to apply measures to sustain the growth of the system. In order to fight issues that may arose as a result of Massive PH already this Christmas.”
He said issues like uploading of fake POP, non confirmation of orders and the rest also contributed to the short ban on mavro growth.
“We all need not panic as our money is in safe hands. Check out your Mavros and you see your money is intact both for 30% bonuses and 20% accrued bonuses
“You can keep PHing if you have the money, though you will definitely not be matched until Mavros are unfrozen. But that will really go a long way for you as your PH made this December will surely be giving you extra 20% after paying out next year,” Chuddy wrote.
A Familiar Pattern
According to Wikipedia, МММ was a Russian company that perpetrated one of the world’s largest Ponzi schemes of all time, in the 1990s. By different estimates from 5 to 40 million people lost up to $10 billion. The exact figures are not known even to the founders.
MMM took its name from its founder, Sergey Mavrodi. He founded MMM in 1989 and the scheme was declared bankrupt three years later leading to the disappearance of Mavrodi until his arrest in 2003.
He was convicted in 2007 in his home country of defrauding 10,000 investors out of 110 million rubles, the equivalent of $4.3 million. MMM is not his first ‘wonder bank’ creation.
MMM collapsed in Zimbabwe in September 2016 leaving thousands of people, among them civil servants and vendors, with thousands of dollars trapped in the ponzi scheme.
