Local and international media are presently intrigued by the story of 62-year-old Maria Grette from Sweden who ‘met’ and fell in love with a Nigerian scam artist named Johnny (to protect his identity), after he came clean to her about conning her out of 1000 euros by pretending to be a Danish man living in the UK with his son.
Maria met Johnny on a dating site and they communicated for a while. She fell for him, and plans to meet him in person led to what was arguably the first stage of the scam – Johnny gets robbed and his son shot in the head on a trip to Nigeria for a job interview, leading him to need her [financial] assistance.
Despite several glaring red flags during their online romance, Maria only caught on to the scam when the financial requests didn’t stop. After ignoring him for three days, Johnny came clean, Maria forgave him, and now her experience has given birth to a new project: Maria wants to make a difference in the lives of young artists in Nigeria.
“Johnny has given me more than he took. Without him, I would not have met Africa.” Cue White woman who’s set to ‘default mode’ saviour complex. While the media might have sensationalised Maria’s experience, even turning it into a sort of morbid love story, it appears that a few obvious facts are being left out. Or maybe they were just conveniently ignored.
Maria can certainly not be faulted for her personal choice in forgiving Johnny for scamming her of thousands of euros or falling for him. But, is it okay for her to aid and abet his crime? First of all, she falls for an internet scam – not a crime in itself, as it could happen to anyone – but goes ahead to ignorantly continue in what seems like an extension of the original scam by having ‘feelings’ for her scammer, thus shielding him from the law.
This brings us to another point. Following her trip to Nigeria to visit her new lover, Maria spends a lot of her time among his scammer-friends and somehow realises she needs to make a difference in the lives of young Nigerian artists? Two questions: where is the link, and how does her ‘difference’ make a difference to the ‘country of scam artists’ image that Nigeria continues to struggle with?
Maria, an artist and art teacher herself, came to Nigeria, aggrieved with the situation of “Nigerian men falling into the whims of scamming” and appeared to want to start an initiative to curb this endemic. However, she ended up starting an initiative to help artists. “I asked myself what I could do to prevent a situation where healthy, good young men fall into this trap,” Maria asked herself. Then two years later, in 2011, she saw an article on a Nigerian news website about an art exhibition. She decided she would arrange for African artists to bring their art to exhibitions, conferences, workshops and competitions in Europe. She has since been assisting them with funds and helping them get international grants.
Beyond the minor nominal similarity, where is the correlation between getting scam artists to turn away from their criminal acts and helping African artists get more exposure for their artworks?
Beyond the superficial good feel to this story, Maria’s intervention is a perfect example of ignorance and what increasingly seems like a default mental mode for certain Westerners who feel like Africa and Africans cannot thrive without their intervention. In their quest to make a difference, they look ‘down’ to Africa even when they do not have the means to make any substantial change, be it within their own communities or abroad.
While we can’t dismiss the goodness of Maria’s actions towards the artists, we must question this growing White Saviour Complex. Maria’s actions will probably be viewed as heroic by some, but until they realise that such actions present Africans as hopeless or helpless, the discourse around the subject matter will remain unsettled.
