PETALING JAYA: It is a scam dating back over two decades which has lured the gullible into believing that they could win the lottery through divine intervention.
The latest to fall victim is a retired boilerman in Klang who lost RM3,250 of his hard-earned savings.
The 65-year-old responded to a social media advertisement of a “monk” offering 4D numbers, with the man claiming to have divine connections with a widely worshipped deity.
MCA Public Services and Complaints Department head Datuk Seri Michael Chong, who disclosed the matter, said the victim known as Ling responded to the advertisement on Oct 7 promoting a supposed wealth and good fortune ritual.
He said the person, claiming to be a monk at a Chinese temple in Pangkor, told Ling that the deity instructed him to buy a 4D number with a RM20 wager.
He was asked to send a snapshot of the betting slip through WhatsApp for praying purposes.
When the number was nowhere in the winning list, the so-called monk told Ling that the deity had revealed two other lucky numbers which could not be disclosed, and offered to buy the numbers for Ling with bets totalling RM300.
Later that night, the scammer claimed that one of the numbers had struck the third prize with RM225,000 in winnings.
Chong told a press conference at Wisma MCA yesterday that Ling was directed by the “monk” to keep the matter even from his wife and then referred to an Ah Tan to handle the prize collection.
Explaining further, Ling said the Ah Tan demanded RM300 as payment for the winning number and paid RM250.
Ling said he was then promised an initial payout of RM50,000 into his account that same day.
When this did not happen, Ling said Ah Tan claimed his boss’ bank account had been frozen over suspected money laundering activities due to the large cash deposit and asked for RM3,000 to unfreeze it.
Chong said Ling pawned his jewellery to raise the money and transferred it in two transactions.
Later, another individual claiming to be a banker demanded another RM3,000 from Ling.
The retiree refused to pay and was allegedly threatened by thugs.
Ling eventually realised he had been duped and approached the MCA.
Chong said people were continuing to fall for promises of easy money.
He said if it was so effective and worked, people should ask why the scammers are not using it to make money for themselves.
He said in the past, victims of a similar scam had also been persuaded to borrow money from loan sharks or pawn their jewellery to “redeem their winnings”, only to later face endless demands for more payment.
