The Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) has alerted the public about fraudsters peddling fake postgraduate scholarships to unsuspecting individuals. In a statement issued on Sunday in Port Harcourt, the NDDC’s Director of Corporate Affairs, Mrs. Seledi Thompson-Wakama, cautioned against falling victim to the scam. She revealed that the fraudsters have been requesting money from people under the guise of helping them obtain scholarship slots. “The attention of the NDDC has been drawn to fraudulent emails and messages sent to applicants of the commission’s Postgraduate Foreign Scholarship Programme,” she said. Thompson-Wakama revealed that the fraudulent emails, purportedly sent from nddcregistry@gmail.com and claiming to be from the NDDC’s ‘Board Registry,’ invite recipients to a fictitious document verification and authentication exercise. According to her, the purported exercise is scheduled to take place from May 19 to May 21 at Bishop Oluwole Street, Victoria Island, Lagos. “Members of the public are hereby advised that the NDDC has no affiliation with this fraudulent selection process,” she stressed. She further clarified that all official communication concerning the commission’s scholarship programme is conducted exclusively through the official NDDC portal: www.scholarship.nddc.gov.ng. “Applicants are strongly advised to disregard any unsolicited messages requesting money, invitation, sensitive information, or offering scholarship placements outside of the official NDDC procedures,” she added. Thompson-Wakama urged anyone who receives such fraudulent emails to report them immediately to the appropriate law enforcement authorities for prompt investigation and action. She encouraged Nigerians interested in the NDDC’s programmes to utilise only the official NDDC communication channels. “We also advise former beneficiaries of the commission’s programmes and prospective applicants to verify all information through the NDDC’s official website: www.nddc.gov.ng,” she concluded.