A 30-year-old student of the University of Ilorin (UNILORIN), Sanni Hameedat, has reportedly committed suicide after she was swindled out of N500, 000 by a ‘lover’ she met on the social media platform, Snapchat.
The deceased who was running Students’ Industrial Work Experience Scheme (SIWES) programme before the incident lived in a private hostel, Rubiks.
The hostel management said in a statement that Hameedat’s death was related to the pressure from the app agents, who were demanding fast repayment.
According to the statement, her inability to pay back the loan threw her into depression before she finally killed herself.
“The cause of suicide was traced to financial misappropriation. She was entrusted with a significant sum of money by her mother. She crossed paths with a guy on Snapchat and developed a friendship.
“When the boy claimed that his mother was battling breast cancer and urgently needed N500,000, the compassionate and emotional lady decided to help him by lending him half of the N1 million she held for her mother. And the boy promised to repay the borrowed money.
“However, when her mother needed the money back, the boy abruptly cut off all contact, blocking her. This left her deeply troubled and in order for her to make up the missing N500, 000, she resorted to borrowing money from various apps.”
“However, when her mother needed the money back, the boy abruptly cut off all contact, blocking her. This left her deeply troubled and in order for her to make up the missing N500, 000, she resorted to borrowing money from various apps,” Rubiks stated.
The deceased was said to have managed to gather N450, 000 from the loan apps, adding her savings of N50, 000 to make up the borrowed N500, 000.
The management said she was reported to have ingested a bottle of pesticide popularly known as Sniper the previous night, and her roommate (name withheld), who had retired to bed early, woke up in the middle of the night to discover her in distress while she was foaming from her mouth and also vomiting.
“Alarmed, the roommate sought help, and she was rushed to UITH before being declared dead,” Rubiks added.
Meanwhile the management of the institution has condoled with the parents, friends, and colleagues of the deceased.
The condolence message is contained in a statement entitled ‘UNILORIN condoles with parents of a deceased student’ issued by the institution’s director of corporate affairs, Mr Kunle Akogun.
The university described the incident as “a most horrible way to die, especially for a promising young lady who had every opportunity before her to make it big in life.”
“The management of the University of Ilorin has received with sadness the death of one of the university students, Sanni Hameedat, by suicide allegedly over a failed financial transaction.
“The cause of suicide was traced to financial misappropriation. She was entrusted with a significant sum of money by her mother. She crossed paths with a guy on Snapchat and developed a friendship,” the institution said.
The management counselled the students of the university to be wary of the company they keep in order not to fall into the trap of scammers.
“The University of llorin is reputed to be a bastion of moral and academic education and we are surprised that any of our students, upon all the moral and academic instructions inculcated in them, could have associated with such undesirable element of a supposed boy friend, and even went ahead to take the extreme step of taking her own life,” the university stated.
