Interview 6
Zaachi (pseudonymize) is 27 years old and has 4 brother and 3 sisters. Zaachi is single and has been in the scamming business for 3 years. Zaachi has leaders and also those under him in the scamming industry. The interview was conducting in the restaurant
Zaachi Immorality and Illegality
Zaachi perceive illegal activities as activities constructed by law enforcement agencies which can be bypass with money and power. On the other hand, he sees immoral activities as activities that God has made unlawful for the entire humanity. He mention that illegal activities are concern with the activities that police and solders are concern about and that when someone does anything illegal, the punishment is imprisonment. However, he believes that immorality has to do with what the religion (Islam) preaches against. According to him, many people can escape the punishment of their illegal activities using money or political powers. But he believes that immoral activities can only be punished by God and that the only way for people to escape the punishment of their immoral activities is to pray to God for forgiveness. According to him, money can buy the law but cannot buy the law of God. According to him, sometimes, something can be illegal in Ghana but not in another country and that something immoral is universal. According to him, God made His law for the entire world and every part of the word should respect the immoral codes. 
“This illegal and immoral, if you don’t take your time, you can think that is the same… But is not the same for me ooo. Because when we say illegal, it is something that police people can arrest you. But when we say or someone say that is immoral, it means that something that is bad in Islam. You are understand? ok, ahhaah that is it. You know this illegal because is police and solder people who can punish for you, if you have money a lot of money… money paa, you can dodge it.. because you can just bride them or if you know this politicians, you can just do illegal thing and they will help and you can go free.. But for the other one, only God can help you out. If you do immoral, only God can punish you or forgive you.. No politician or your money can help….
Zaachi perspective on being moral and legal 
According to him, he  believes that the law or moral codes are not meant to be followed all the time. According to him, the law makers and God know that human beings cannot always follow either the laws or the moral codes. According to him, if a person strictly follow the laws and the moral codes, the person cannot function. According to him, the world is a disorganized place and nothing works according to the law or the moral standards and that, if anyone tries to always act lawful or moral the person will always be the one to suffer. He gave an example of having a girlfriend without sex. He mentioned that everyone, whether Muslims or Christians believe that fornication is immoral but people cannot date or be in a relationship without sex in the contemporary society. According to him, if a person has a girlfriend and doesn’t have sex with her, the girl will leave such a person for another guy who can give her good sex. 
“Master, you lie.. nobody can follow the laws or the other, the moral all the time.. Even God who create us, He know that nobody can follow him all the time..even the police too know that because, master, if you follow the law too much, you can not function.. you can’t chop.. Hunger go kill you… even just think this one, somebody will have a girlfriend and will not chop her and another person will chop her.. she will just runaway from the one who don’t chop her.. but you know this sex, God don’t like it. If you are a Muslim or Christian or anything, you know that if you no marry a girl, you are suppose to chop or sleep with her, but these days, if you no chop your girlfriend she go run and leave you…

Zaachi view on conditions on breaking the laws
Zaachi believe that people break the laws or act immoral because of strains that comes within the society. He mentioned the case of his friend to had to shoot another person because he was consistently bullied by the person. According to him, the person always bully his friend during their sakawa dealings, including using force to take his clients from him, stopping him from being part of groups that can help him. According to him, his friend became so pressed that he had to shoot the bully to claim his freedom. According to him, though the person he shot didn’t die but he stopped bullying his friend after recovery. 
You know say, bad bad things is happening and if you no do something you can function. People are wicked, life is tough my brother. If you are not strong, you will die… sometimes, somebody will be doing you something bad, if you don’t fight him, you will be get freedom. Example, my guy be, one guy was just disturbing him, taking his clients by force. He was making his life difficult..sometimes, master, he didn’t just like my guy..so one day, he collected my guy client and we go to him to take the money but he was just talking too much and telling my guy that he will beat him if he don’t there.. I didn’t know my guy get gun…the thing turn fight and my guy shoot his leg…. Hahah we run fast haha… he didn’t die but he don’t disturb my guy again… yeah,
Also, he added that sometimes a person will be aware that something is immoral but will still do it because of the strains, using the case of scamming. According to him, he knows that scamming is not good because religious leaders have told them about the implication of scam in the face of God. According to him, though he knows that scamming is not good but he can’t stop it because he doesn’t have a job or any meaning means to earn and that scamming is the last option. According to him, if not because of the scam, a lot of youngsters would have been arm robbers in the country. 
Master, you know poverty no good…you no hear Nkwah song?...the song say that ‘poverty no good ooh, na e make I join this business.. 419 eno be thief, is just a game, everybody de play am’..hahaha…. the song is talking about life..This scamming we dey do, master, because we no get job. We know say, it is not good, God don’t like it but if we no do it, we can’s survive.. that is why we are doing it…if you stop now, it means we will be arm rubbers.. and for that one, they will kill us.. we will also kill some people..but his game, we no dey kill anybody, we no dey steal for road, just on the internet…
He also gave the case of the unnecessary nature of the law. According to him, sometimes the law is useless and people don’t see the need to obey such law. He mentioned the case of smoking wed to give an example. He mentioned that smoking wed is not illegal in some countries and in Ghana is illegal and he doesn’t see anything wrong with smoking wed. According to him, smoking wed should not be a crime because smoking wed doesn’t cause any problem in the society and that smoking wed only helps people to facilitate their activities. He gave an example of how smoking wed helps. According to him, when a person has a lot of troubles in his mind and smokes wed, he can solve the psychological traumas. He also mentioned that smoking wed helps the effective functioning of the brain. According to him, people can’t obey such unimportant laws. To him the law is mistaken sometimes. He questioned why drinking alcohol is not a crime in the country but smoking wed is a problem. According to him, just like smoking wed, many people drink alcohol to solve their psychological problem and yet drinking alcohol is not a crime. According to him, if the law makers are critical, they should have been able to realize that both smoking wed and drinking alcohol shouldn’t be a crime or if they should all  be considered a crime. And to him, drinking alcohol should have even be a crime and not smoking wed. He justified this, saying that alcohol is immoral and its not accepted in Islam. 
Master, see the thing ooh.. those who dey make the laws, if they have sense they go know say, wed is not suppose to be illegal. Because drinking alcohol and smoking wed are all the same. Because some people when they are thinking too much, they will drink alcohol but some people will smoke wed. Everybody and their choice. But this law makers think say wed is crime but alcohol is not a crim. If wed is a crime, alcohol should also be some crime too… even self, wed is better because God don’t like alcohol.. the malams (religious leaders) are saying it all the time…that if you drink alcohol is haram.. so alcohol for be crime self and not wed…..

He also mentioned that human desire sometimes makes people to break the law or the moral standards. According to him, every young person in the country knows that formication is immoral but because people like to have sexual intercourse, they still have fornication. According to him, its difficult sometimes to control the desires. He mentioned that some people have even normalized some immoral and illegal things because those behaviors and actions have become rampant in the society. According to him, though scamming and fornication are both immoral, the society doesn’t care about it again and that people stopped to even consider them as immoral. However, he believes that since the Quran says it is immoral, it will continue to be immoral even when the whole world starts to do them. 

Zaachi opinion on scamming, whether is illegal or immoral, and why so
Zaachi mentioned that the entirety of scamming is immoral and that he supports the law when they make it illegal too. However, he believes that, its illegal because its immoral and deviates the teaches of the Quran. He mentioned that if we take the immorality out of the picture, he wouldn’t say that scamming is illegal because it scamming doesn’t hurt the country in anyway. According to him, the immorality of scamming is the reason why he supports the illegality of it. He mentioned that even the law makers doubt that scamming is illegal because he knows some police officers who are also scammers. He also gave an adage to further devalued the law – “Nothing is illegal until you’re caught”. He mentioned that the law is useless in accounting for what we do until a person is caught. 
For sure, this scam is illegal and immoral.. but if you take God outside, then scam is not bad..because scam is not bad because master, we don’t steal anybody for this country. we don’t do anything wrong in the country. even I know some police officers. They dey do the game some… if they believe say scamming is illegal, why are they doing it too? Me, I agree say scamming is illegal because is haram. But if it was not haram, then fuck police… I mean if like is the Quran is not against this game, then I will say that the game is not a crime… yes, is not illegal… master, there is a saying that “nothing is a crime until you are caught” you know here that before… so scamming no be crime because we no dey steal anybody for this country, not to talk of police catching us..they should get out…
According to him, even when someone is caught, it doesn’t actually means the person has committed a crime. What does means it that the person is vulnerable (doesn’t have enough money, or he’s just a suspect or something else). He said that, he doesn’t care about the law if religion is not part of the discussion. According to him, scamming involves three things that are all immoral according to Quran – lying, stealing, and hurting. To him, scam starts with lies and ends with lies, explaining that the lies start from creating the profile on social media or dating site (pretending to be a business man or a girl or a white person). According to him  they lie to collect the money from the white people and they lie about their relationship too. According to him, this causes both financial lost and emotional damage to the white people. According to him, every scammer knows that scamming is immoral. On the contrary, he mentioned that sometimes, you can find an angle in the devil. To explained, he mentioned that though scam is bad and entirely immoral it support them to feed themselves and their families. 

Zaachi attitude with clients
He categorized client attitude into two. According to him, those scammers who have already made a lot of money in the scamming industry will feel pity on a client, especially when the client is poor or doesn’t have enough. According to him, those who have enough money in the scamming industry doesn’t even like to take money from poor people but they still use poor white people for some other purpose (like money mules). According to him, when rich scammer meet poor clients, they only need clients trust and not their money. He mentioned that when scammers build the trust with clients, they (scammers) will use such clients as money mules and even give them some part of the money. On the contrary, he mentioned that those who are still new in the scam or those who haven’t made enough money in the scamming business will still try to collect some money from poor white people because they (young scammers) believe that those poor white people social and economic conditions are better than theirs (young scammers)
Master it depends your level in the scam.. you know say, some people already get a lot of money for the scam inside. For them, they no dey scam poor white people.. when they catch a client way that client no get money, they go use him for business… Business is like, they will take her account details and make different client in different country to send money to her.. so that she can send it to the scammer…you know, they will first of all make sure say, they gain her trust,. So when they other client send the money to her, the scammer can tell her to take something and send the rest to him… it depends how much…sometimes the scammer can give her 2000 dollars, even sometimes more than that… like 5000 dollars or 10000 dollars, it depends the amount….but you say those small boys.. those boys who are just starting,, they are very dangerous haha….. because for them, they no get pity for white person, whether the client get money or not, for them, they will collect her money because they think say, all white people get money…so it depends master…
Zaachi mentioned that he has never decided to stop taking money from his clients though sometimes he feels that he shouldn’t continue taking the money. According to him, he met a client who always give him the money he requested. However, there came a time that the client didn’t have enough money to send him but he couldn’t stop taking the little the client has because he also needed the money. According to him, if he had richer clients at the time, he would have stopped scamming the client but he didn’t have any rich client at that time. According to him, the little the client was given him, was helping him to stay alive and to search for richer clients. In the nutshell, interviewee6 mentioned that he has never decided to stop scamming any of his client though he might feel the need to stop. According to him, the best way to continue scamming is to forget about how you think about client or the guilt will interrupt you. He added another story about how he wished it was a real chat and not a scam. According to him, he used a military format and introduced his real identity to the scammer as an adopted son to the military man. According to him, the client was so kind and caring to him (adopted son ) to the extend that he wished it was a real family. According to him, the client was given him (as a partner) and him (as adopted son) so much attention and care that he was tempted to tell the women (client) the truth. According to him however, he didn’t tell her it was a scam because he didn’t want to stop earning from her. 

Zaachi perception about who becomes a client
According to him, the business is purposefully for scamming  white people because the white man’s conditions are not the same as the black man. According to him, whereas it’s easy for white people to get money and to give to somebody, its very hard for black people to get enough money. According to him, the purpose of scam is to make money and that scamming black people will not make any sense. He mentioned that, since scamming is  sin, it informs their decision to scam only the white and not black people. He mentioned that, white people can easily forgive when you steal their money but a black person doesn’t forgive easily. So scamming the white people has an advantage over the black, according to him. To him, since the white people can forgive scammers it is better to scam the white people than to scam black. 
Master, this scam is to make money not just a game…the whites are those who get the money.. a black person no get money. if you want to succeed, you for scam white people because they get enough money…plus you know that scamming is not good because is haram.. you know black man is very wicked. If you scam a black man he will never forgive you and God go punish rough… but his white people, you can just scam them and tell them you are sorry and they will forgive you. So master, if you be the one which one will you scam?....thank you, that is why we dey scam the white people because so far us they forgive you, God will forgive you too…..
He also mentioned that scamming white people is less dangerous because of the distance. According to him, when you scam a white person, the person might find it difficult to locate you even if he (client) wanted to punish you (scammer). But with a black man, especially in Ghana, he (client) can easily get you arrested. According to him, the black man might even use spiritual means to kill you for scamming him.. 
However, he mentioned that there are some people who can scam everyone. According to him, those people don’t care whether you are a black or white, but they are mostly scamming Ghanaian. According to him, those people are local scammers and they use difference format. According to him, those local scammers uses tricks like ‘money doubling”, romance scam, giving lottery numbers, etc. He mentioned that, the local scammers can even scam their own friends. However, he mentioned that, for them (scammers), they only scam white people. According to him, before he started scamming, somebody and his girlfriend scammed him through Facebook messenger. According those people (local scammers) where in Accra. According to him, the boy was using his girlfriend’s pictures online to search for local clients and he fell into their trap. According to him, he was chatting with the boy on Facebook but when it phone calls where require, the boy will make his girlfriend to receive the call. According to him, He always try to get money for the girl (scammer) until he wanted to meet the girl in real. The girl (scammer) demanded money for transport and when he sent the money, but the girl gave him a reasonable excuse not to meet. According to him, the girl called him one day and requesting him to buy a phone for her and he’s friend (also a scammer) told him that the girl was a scammer. He mentioned that, he and his friend were able to trace the scam to the scammers.