A popular Obidient who runs the propaganda handle @PIDOMNIGERIA on X has been arrested by the police on charges related to computer fraud and terrorism financing. The Obidient whose real name as seen on police documents is Bristol Tamunobiefiri Isaac, was reportedly arrested on August 5th in his hotel room in Port Harcourt, Rivers State and has been in police custody ever since.
@PIDOMNIGERIA’s latest travail was brought to the public attention by another notorious misinformation and fake news merchant, Mr. David Hundeyin. Hundeyin who is a self-professed investigative journalist and currently on self-imposed exile published an article on his X handle where he raised an alarm alleging that PIDOM NIGERIA, who he described as an anonymous whistleblower and a friend has been missing for more than two weeks.
According to Mr. Hundeyin, he received a message from PIDOMNIGERIA’s account, informing him that PIDOM (Bristol Isaac) had been arrested on August 5 and has been transferred to the Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID) in Abuja, where he has been under the custody of the National Cybercrime Centre (NCCC).
Hundeyin narrated how he got access to PIDOMNIGERIA’s X account, and eventually changed the login password which he said triggered hacking attempts on his WhatsApp account. He also alleged that the so-called associate of Bristol Isaac (@PIDOMNIGERIA) who reached out to break the news of the arrest appealed to him to continue tweeting using @PIDOMNIGERIA account as though he was still the one in control of the account.
A police bail document seen by Podium Reporters however reveal that the suspect, Bristol Isaac (PIDOMNIGERIA) has been offered administrative bail by the police since 15th August, 2024. However, as a condition attached to the bail, Bristol Isaac (PIDOMNIGERIA) is expected to provide two sureties who are either federal or state government employee of not less than grade level 16 and who has a landed property in Abuja worth at least N500 million.
The police also gave the suspect option of providing a businessman who owns a business registered with the corporate affairs commission and who has a landed property worth N500 million in Abuja or in any state capital in Nigeria. Apparently, Bristol Isaac has been unable to meet either of these bail conditions. Mr. Hundeyin described the conditions as impossible to meet.
Meanwhile, information has emerged indicating that the arrested Bristol Isaac (PIDOMNIGERIA) may in fact be linked to the $37M crypto assets frozen by the NSA for terrorism financing and money laundering following a court order made by Justice Emeka Nwite of the Federal High Court, Abuja around two weeks ago.
Mr. David Hundeyin in his narration revealed that his friend, PIDOM in a bid to remain ‘anonymous’ and cover his tracks, uses cryptocurrency to carry out his ‘daily transactions’, stating that in fact PIDOMNIGERIA has his Tether and bitcoin wallet addresses pinned to the top of his Twitter profile. Hundeyin went further to admit that two of the addresses frozen by the office of the NSA on the order of a Federal High Court were PIDOM’s Tether and bitcoin addresses.
As the controversy raged on, commentators especially on the social media platform X have picked holes in the account of events put forward by Mr. David Hundeyin as he publicly announced a takeover of the account @PIDOMNIGERIA. Some Nigerians believe that Mr. Hundeyin, being a notorious liar who frequently makes false and misleading claims, has not completely honest with his story concerning PIDOMNIGERIA and how he got access to PIDOMNIGERIA’s X account.
For instance, Mr. David Hundeyin first tried to establish that he has always maintained a “friendly and mutually respectful” relationship with Bristol Isaac (PIDOMNIGERIA) and emphasised that they have both ‘worked’ independently in the fake news and misinformation ecosystem even though many have insinuated that PIDOM NIGERIA is his alter ego considering the fact that the only X account PIDOMNIGERIA follows is that of David Hundeyin. Interestingly, Hundeyin acknowledges that neither him nor PIDOMNIGERIA has been eager to dispel the notion that they are one and the same person, adding that this has provided an extra layer of security for him.
The above line from Mr. Hundeyin according to some commentators, is filled with some red flags, which may provide insights to the credibility or otherwise of Hundeyin’s narration about the ordeal of Bristol Isaac and in fact the entire operation of the handle @PIDOMNIGERIA. Many believe that the story by Hundeyin stating that someone reached out to him using PIDOMNIGERIA’s account to inform him of Bristol Isaac’s instructions for him to take over the account and be tweeting like him may in fact be a big lie and fabrication by Hundeyin to conceal his association with the account @PIDOMNIGERIA.
Some believe that from the beginning Hundeyin has actually had access to the PIDOMNIGERIA’s account and probably even created the account and handed it over to Bristol Isaac to be managing it semi-independently. Speaking along this line of argument, an X user said, “David Hundeyin has not been truthful in this whole PIDOM issue. If you look at the cock and bull story David narrated to justify how he got the login details of PIDOM, an averagely smart person will immediately see the loopholes.”
“First, Hundeyin subtly tried to establish that he is not the same person with PIDOM, which may be true to an extent. I strongly believe what happened is that David was the one who created the PIDOM twitter account and gave it to Bristol Isaac to be managing. David himself has complete access to the account and actually activate 2FA using his number. So, nobody reached out to him to give him any login details for PIDOM because he has always had it! David Hundeyin simply logged into PIDOM X account and started sending those messages he screenshot to his main handle.
“People really underrate the kind of fabrications and lies that guy is capable of. He just narrated those stories in order to water the ground to finally take over the PIDOM account as David Hundeyin. I’m very certain that he was forced to take this action because his employee, Bristol Isaac who is Nigeria may have been traced and arrested by the security agencies and Hundeyin is scared that his cover has been blown open and he smartly decided to play this card. It is possible that the police in the course of their investigation and interrogation of Bristol Isaac must have discovered that the main person behind the PIDOMNIGERIA account and all the fraud it may have committed was actually David Hundeyin while the Bristol Isaac they were able to arrest is just an accomplice, who do not really have access to the crypto wallets pinned on the X profile of PIDOM.
“This is why the police was willing to grant Bristol Isaac an administrative bail. For a crime of such magnitude and considering the fact that the suspect may be a flight risk if bailed, it is curious that the police were willing to grant Bristol Isaac bail if indeed he was the prime suspect in the computer fraud and other charges leveled against him. The police simply realised that David Hundeyin was the main man behind everything.
“Another red flag in Hundeyin’s tale by the moonlight that I’m sure many will miss is his subtle talk about the last scam PIDOM was involved in during the #EndBackGovernanceProtest where he sought for donation to provide logistics and feeding to protesters and which eventually led to the scammer being scammed. If you noticed, David was careful when he said that he and PIDOM has not spoken since early August because he was somewhat displeased with PIDOM due to what he stylishly called “a difference in opinion” regarding the recent protests.
“David said he favoured stepping back and allowing Nigerians to speak to themselves organically (whatever that means) while PIDOM was of the idea that defacto leadership needed to be established to assist the protest logistically. If you are not very smart you’ll think David made any sense with the above statement but when you analyse it, you will realise that if what he said was their so-called difference in opinion, then it means they simply didn’t have any difference. David’s so-called position is not in any way opposite of PIDOM’s alleged position. While David was talking about allowing Nigerians to SPEAK for themselves organically, PIDOM was pushing for donations to help transport, provide water and feed willing protesters and not necessarily interested in the coordinating the message or demands of the protesters.
“So, when you look at it critically, it becomes obvious that David Hundeyin was actually the brain behind PIDOM’s request for donation to support the logistics. David is only trying to distance himself from it because it went wrong. David that we all know has always sought for public donation to support his propaganda work and his type will not be against people donating to support logistics. Hundeyin is simply trying to play very smartly and I must give it to him, he has been able to deceive many people especially the Obidients who lack critical thinking ability.
“It is time people really begin to understand who David is and what he is capable of pulling off. He is obviously chatting with himself. Check the part he was talking about being given incorrect password by the PIDOM associate, he was just blabbing, and ended up by saying that eventually the password worked and he found himself in PIDOM NIGERIA’s account and immediately changed the password and set up fresh mutli-factor authentication. The truth is that David Hundeyin did not find himself inside PIDOMNIGERIA’s account, he has always been inside the account from the beginning. Every crime PIDOMNIGERIA may have committed obviously has the signature and imprimatur of David Hundeyin”, the X user concluded.