The culprit says the counterfeited notes were smuggled in from a neighbouring country.

A 17-year-old boy, identified by many as a notorious fake currency broker, was last Monday night, swooped by an irate population at the Bonaberi neighbourhood in Douala. Yanick was rapt with a lump sum of FCFA 200,000 which he sneakily haggled from one bar to another. At the time of arrest, the culprit had successfully used the sum of FCFA 80,000 to buy beer, barbecued meat and cigarettes.

"The boy had dashed into my bar twice, coming within an interval of two hours", one of four victims recounted. "Each time, he slipped in a bank note of FCFA 10, 000," she continued. "The first time, he bought two bottles of Guinness and collected a balance of FCFA 8,000. The second time, he took a bottle of wine and a balance of FCFA 7,500. I later realized that the notes were all counterfeit, bearing the same serial numbers and seemingly printed on ordinary pulp sheet. But I could not trace him," the barmaid explained.

Yanick and three others had a daily target. They ought to exchange the total sum of FCFA 200,000 for legal tender. The four who by 9 p.m. had begun dangling under the dictate of alcohol unstably swayed towards the grill area where they placed a command for hunchback. Once served, Yanick dolled out the sum of FCFA 10,000 from which he expected the balance of FCFA 9,000. This time, the venture failed. The seller had swiftly detected the fake note, using an adapted mercury lamp. Yanick and co took to their heels. The victim alarmed and madly charged after them. Dozens of drinkers and peddlers joint him. The squirmy culprits wangled, roved and skipped across a paralleled railway, plunging into adjacent thick greenery. The population, some visibly driven by alcohol, tracked on.

The four men quadrupled their steps. The population followed. The race and ululations intensified. But the drama was short-lived. The hunted soon came to the brink of a lethal swamp. The weary crowd faced them, pounced on them, smashed them and pounded them with showers of pitiless blows. Death smelled. Then, Yanick confessed that a customer, who pays him FCFA 4,000 out of every FCFA 10,000 dolled out, smuggles in the fake notes from a neighbouring country every month.