Police arrest woman over fake OPay shutdown notice
The Nigeria Police Force National Cybercrime Centre has arrested 27-year-old Hafsat Abubakar after investigating a notice that falsely claimed fintech company OPay would suspend operations from September 1.
OPay publicly denied the notice, saying its operations were continuing normally and warning customers not to act on the viral claim.
The document, which OPay said was false, advised customers to remove funds from their accounts before an alleged indefinite shutdown.
Police say forensic tracing led to her account
Police said the National Cybercrime Centre began investigating after receiving a petition from OPay on August 31.
According to the police account, digital forensic analysis traced publication of the document to the X handle @HAIFAH_ER_ABBA, which investigators said was registered and operated by Abubakar.
Police arrested her on September 4.
That remains a police allegation within an ongoing investigation.
The fact that police traced the publication to an account they link to her and arrested her does not, by itself, establish that she created the forged notice or committed a criminal offence.
Abubakar says she deleted the post and apologised
Abubakar has said she did not know the information was false when she posted it.
She said she removed the publication and apologised after OPay publicly challenged the notice.
According to her account, she complied with OPay’s request to delete the post and apologise before she was later arrested following the company’s petition.
Her deletion of the post and apology do not amount to a legal finding that she created the document or is guilty of an offence.
What remains unresolved
The current record establishes that OPay denied the shutdown notice, that police arrested Abubakar, and that investigators say they traced publication of the document to an account linked to her.
What remains unresolved is whether investigators establish that she created the forged document, merely reposted or circulated it, and whether any criminal charge will ultimately be filed and sustained.
Those distinctions matter because publishing false information, creating a forged document and being found criminally liable are separate findings.
The next decisive development will be the formal legal record: whether charges are filed, what offence is alleged and what evidence is placed before a court.