Get Rich or Die Trying: The Chinese multinational scamming millions from Ugandans

[Elisabeth Janaina]

Get Rich or Die Trying: The Chinese multinational scamming millions
from Ugandans
Posted on January 31, 2017 by James Wan
Thousands of people in Uganda have signed up to a company believing it
will cure all their illnesses and help them make a fortune. It is more
likely to do the opposite.

This article is republished here to coincide with the new documentary
Uganda’s Health Pyramid (trailer above), aided by African Arguments,
into the company TIENS in Uganda. The film, made by Banyak, will be
available on AlJazeera from 1st February 2017. The article below was
originally published on Think Africa Press (now defunct) in 2014. As
the documentary shows, not much has changed.

On the corner of a bumpy, red-soil road in the rural town of Iganga in
eastern Uganda, there lies a small store. A handful of people mill
around the entrance in the glaring sun, waiting their turn to enter.
They are the main source of activity on this placid street, but their
patient presence barely betrays the hubbub within.

Inside, almost a dozen people sit crammed on makeshift benches around
two edges of the stifling room. Most of the remaining space is taken
up by a shop counter, behind which are shelves piled high with
vibrantly-coloured health products covered in Chinese characters.

A couple of customers compete with a baby wailing as they read out
lists of products to the shop attendants who pick them off the
shelves. Every now and then, the door in the corner opens. Someone
steps out, usually holding a piece of paper, and the person sitting
closest steps in.

Beyond that doorway is an even smaller room, windowless and
illuminated by a single light. As I peer in, three people are
undergoing diagnostic tests, a woman is standing on a machine that
hums loudly as it vibrates, and a few more patients are waiting
slumped along the wall.

Wasswa Zziwa Edrisa − or “Doctor Wasswa” as he is known here − stands
in the centre wearing a fresh, chequered shirt on his back and an
unwavering grin on his face. With the easy charm of a seasoned
salesman and the swaggering self-assurance of Uganda’s national bird
and symbol, the crested crane, Wasswa welcomes me in.

“I will show you how we help so many people,” he says, beaming. “Let
me show you the machines.”

“This is one of the scanners,” he explains, pointing to a piece of kit
that looks a bit like a 1970s radio. “It shows everything. We can see
if you have diabetes, kidney deficiencies, liver problems, eye
problems. Everything.”

Wasswa explains that the test works using a traditional Chinese
understanding of the body whereby different points of the hand relate
to different internal organs. We watch as an attendant prods a
patient’s left palm with a metal tip, making a little meter light up.
When the light goes green, he explains, it means that part of the body
is fine, but if it goes orange it indicates a problem.

Next Wasswa points me to the corner where a woman is standing on a
small machine and holding onto a pair of handlebars to which she is
harnessed. Her whole body blurs in the dim light as the platform
beneath her vibrates rapidly, its droning buzz filling the room.

Similar machines can be found in many gyms these days and are meant to
help tone muscle, but the uses Wasswa presents are quite different.

“This is a blood circulation massager,” he announces. “You see how she
sweats. It opens the vessels and deals with paralysis. It helps people
with stroke.”

Wasswa then shows me another diagnostics machine, this one connected
to a laptop. As the patient holds on to an appliance plugged into the
computer, pictures of different organs flash up on the screen for a
few seconds each as a dial next to it oscillates erratically. After a
minute, a one-page document pops up, listing how well his organs are
functioning.

In the airless room, Wasswa runs through a few more devices − a face
pain remover, a blood pressure reducer, a necklace that removes
radiation − before squeezing past bodies and chairs to get back to the
first patient we met. By now his diagnostic test is complete. He tells
me that he came to the store because of some mild pain around his
mouth, but Wasswa breaks the news that there are more serious things
about which he ought to be concerned.

“Ah, he has a problem with his spleen,” says Wasswa, nodding
knowingly. “At times, he gets constipation and some swelling in the
legs and arms. There is also some paralysis in the legs. He gets
headaches. At times he feels dizziness. His brain arteries need to be
detoxified. He has kidney deficiencies. He has bad chest pain. He has
high cholesterol. He has poor circulation. And he has problems with
his stomach.”

The roster of the young and healthy-looking patient’s conditions seems
extreme, but Wasswa is not perturbed.

“He needs to improve his circulation by using our machines and he will
need to take our products. If he uses them, he will be fine,” he
reassures.

Back in the light and noise of the waiting-room-cum-pharmacy, Wasswa
shows me some of these products. He picks goods off the shelves,
ranging from capsules to toothpastes to body creams, and stacks them
on the counter as he explains what they each do. “This takes away all
the radiation in your body. This helps with diabetes. This treats
ulcers. This is for slimming. This adds more white blood cells to your
system. This is for people who are mentally disturbed,” he says.

“These medicines are good for everything,” he concludes finally, the
pile of products on the counter now complete. “If you have cancer, we
can help. If you have HIV, we can help. Even if you have a hernia or a
tumour or appendicitis, you just take our products and they will
disappear.”
Wasswa and products

Wasswa (right) piles TIENS products up on the counter of the store in Iganga.

This small store in eastern Uganda employs a handful of staff and,
according to Wasswa, receives dozens of patients each day. Wasswa is
also frequently heard on local radio advertising his services and has
made quite a name for himself in the area. He was previously a school
teacher and says his parents were “peasants”, but now, in his 30s, he
is anything but. These days, Wasswa drives a shiny four-wheel drive,
wears sharp suits and even goes on jet-setting trips around the world.
All this makes him quite the exception in Iganga, but across Uganda,
this young ‘doctor’ is by no means a solo pioneer and his store is by
no means unique.

Similar stores can found all across the country, from Kasese in the
west to Soroti in the east, and from Gulu in the north to Entebbe in
the south. There are four such outlets in Kampala alone. These stores
offer the same diagnostic tests, stock the same range of products, and
above all their doors, there hangs the same innocuous green and orange
sign which reads: “TIENS: Together We Share Health And Wealth.”

TIENS − also known as Tianshi − is a multinational company based
10,000 miles away in the Chinese metropolis of Tianjin. It was founded
in 1995 by Li Jinyuan, who has since become a billionaire from the
venture. The company has established branches in 110 countries
including 16 in Africa, employs over 10,000 staff globally, and
reportedly enjoys net profits worth hundreds of millions of dollars
each year.

TIENS first began tapping into the Ugandan market in 2003 and it has
grown steadily ever since. There are now around 30 stores across the
country, TIENS distributors regularly engage in outreach programmes to
rural communities, and according to the company’s national
chairperson, Kibuuka Mazinga Ambrose, TIENS-Uganda has an annual
turnover of around $6 million.

The company has even bought the most prominent advertising spot on the
Health Ministry’s official calendar, a particularly brazen move given
that none of its outlets are registered health facilities.

Patients who come to TIENS seek help for a whole range of conditions −
from malaria to paralysis − but they tend to tell similar stories of
how they arrived here. Typically, they say that they first went to
public facilities (some told me they had even visited two or three),
but were either not seen to or found the treatment ineffective. TIENS
is almost always a last resort. But in a country whose healthcare
infrastructure is riddled with chronic problems and which, by some
measures, ranks as one of the worst in the world, the last resort is
often one that needs to be taken.

In many areas of Uganda, public health facilities are virtually
inaccessible, while those who do manage to reach them may find their
walls crumbling, their clinics under-staffed, and their shelves bereft
of drugs. Although the government has promised to invest more in the
sector, much of the country’s healthcare infrastructure is in decay.
Doctors and nurses are over-worked and underpaid, and although
services are meant to be free, in reality patients face many hidden
costs.

In this context, stores like Wasswa’s − with its quick turnaround,
attentive staff and fully-stocked shelves − offer an appealing
alternative. The always conclusive diagnostic tests are highly
convenient; attendants’ claims about the healing powers of TIENS
products may well be reassuring; and many patients say the fact the
medicines travelled thousands of miles from China suggest they must
work.

Many customers who use TIENS products also insist that they do work.
TIENS vibration plate

A patient uses a “blood circulation massager.” In gyms, these are
known as Power Plates.

On the Friday morning after my tour of Wasswa’s clinic, the courtyard
next to the outlet is packed. Over a hundred people sit on plastic
chairs facing forwards while latecomers lean against the back wall. A
red tarpaulin sheet shields the crammed attendees from the sun and
gives the whole atmosphere an eerie pink hue.

‘Doctor Julius’, a man in his late-30s with an intense glare and
impatient demeanour, stands at the front. He has just finished
explaining the healing powers of TIENS toothpaste − which as well as
cleaning teeth, can be used to treat ulcers, angina and skin problems
amongst many other conditions − and he invites attendees who have used
the product to give testimony. Four hands go up immediately.

“I had terrible problems with my teeth,” says the first speaker. “I
went to see doctors but a new tooth had to be uprooted every week.
When I started to use TIENS toothpaste, the pain went away.”

The next patient tells a very similar story before two mothers relay
how the toothpaste cleared up their respective children’s skin rashes
and burns.

Every now and then over the next few hours, many more attendees are
invited to recount their experiences of using TIENS products. We hear
how a man with back pain can now walk, how another man was cured of
vertigo, and how a woman’s child was once bed-ridden but is now
running around. At one point, Wasswa looks particularly pleased as a
mother tells of how her young son − who she had taken to three
separate public healthcare facilities before he was cured of cerebral
malaria by TIENS − now wants to change his name to ‘Doctor Wasswa’.

“You see, these products work,” Wasswa announces after one of the
testimonies. “At hospitals, they will ask you how you feel, but here,
we tell you how you feel. At hospitals, they treat signs and symptoms.
Here, we treat causes. At hospitals, they give you medicines made from
chemicals which are harmful and can give you ulcers. Here, we use
herbal medicines which have no side-effects.”

“This is real,” he continues. “This is Chinese herbal medicine based
on 5,000 years of traditional medicine and it works.”
TIENS test

A patient gets tested by a TIENS attendant.

In Kampala, I test this out for myself. I visit a couple of the
company’s stores, nestled in the city centre’s endless bustling
plazas, and in one of them, managed by an intense man named Frank, I
get tested.

Frank, the self-declared “best in the business” at doing diagnostic
tests, seems thrilled at my presence and bundles me across to the end
of the room. He sits me down and pulls across a thin curtain to give
us a modicum of privacy from the handful of waiting patients. He takes
out a battered looking hand-held device, pushes a 9-volt battery into
its back and plugs a wire into it that branches into two metal tips.
He gives me one of the electrified points to hold in my right hand and
says he will use the other to press points on my left palm. With a
grave look on his face, Frank instructs me to tell him when I feel a
tingling. This seems to be a more basic version of the first test I’d
seen in Iganga.

To begin with, I report whenever I feel something, which is every
single time the tip touches my hand, completing the basic electric
circuit. Frank nods excitedly when I do so and explains that I have a
serious problem in whichever part of my body he is testing. After a
while, however, I decide to stop reporting every time I feel a
tingling. Frank lets me get away with one, but after that he frowns
when I stay silent and simply keeps the metal point on my hand until I
give in, sometimes rubbing my hand and even licking the metal tip if I
am being particularly resistant.

In the end, Frank writes out a list of around 25 health conditions
including “liver disorder,” “STROKE,” and “enteric fever [aka severe
typhoid],” and prescribes a roster of products that comes to over USH
1 million ($400).

Before committing to his costly regimen, I decide to get a second opinion.

In the bright, clean reception of Beijing Clinic, a private health
facility in Kampala, I relate my experience to a young Ugandan doctor,
who trained and qualified in China, specialising in traditional
Chinese medicine. The doctor, who prefers not to be named, laughs as I
explain the machines I saw in Iganga and the test I underwent in
Kampala. “No machine can test all those things like they claim,” he
says.

Next, I show him the TIENS Information Guide, a booklet from which it
seems Julius and Wasswa get most of their information. On page 3 of
the booklet, a short disclaimer warns: “Tianshi Company does not make
any medical claims whatsoever.” However, the next 60 pages are filled
with bold declarations about the powers of its products and
instructions on how to treat different diseases.

“Whatever this is, it is not Chinese medicine,” says the
Chinese-trained doctor with a combination of amusement and
incredulity. He chuckles as he reads how TIENS medicines are supposed
to treat about a dozen different conditions each, from preventing
cancer to reversing impotence to promoting “the growth of children’s
reproductive organs.”

However, the doctor’s amusement soon turns to horror as he reaches the
section of the booklet advising distributors on what steps to take
when patients are suffering from different diseases. TIENS customers
are typically encouraged to undergo diagnostic tests in store, but
most who go to TIENS have previously been to hospital and know some of
the conditions from which they are suffering. The company guide offers
clear and easy instructions on what they should be prescribed.

Of the few hundred conditions listed − which span from AIDS to Yellow
Fever − a handful include the recommendation to ‘see a doctor’. But
the rest just list a few products to be taken.

“This is a death sentence,” mutters the doctor, falling silent.

One of the most repeated claims by TIENS distributors is that because
the products are ‘herbal’, they have no side-effects. This assertion
is used to elevate them above Western medicines, which they say are
made from chemicals and so can be harmful, but the claim is also used
to suggest that there are no dangers involved in taking them.

“Even if I tell you to swallow one and you swallow four, there will be
no problems,” Wasswa had insisted. But when put to the Chinese-trained
doctor in Beijing Clinic, he just shakes his head. “That is a flat out
lie,” he says.

He recalls that last year, he was consulted by police after a man
suffering from kidney problems died suddenly from liver failure. A
toxicology report found that he had had a toxic overdose and it was
suggested that the herbal supplements the patient had been taking
without his doctor’s knowledge had either caused additional problems
or reacted badly with other medicines. The man’s family could not
afford to get a more detailed medical report, however, and declined to
take the matter further.

At another private clinic in Kampala, Dr Wen, a highly-regarded
practitioner with three decades experience, is similarly concerned.
“This is not medicine,” he says, “but it is still dangerous.
Everything has side-effects. Even herbal medicines and herbal
supplements used wrongly can kill.”

I contacted Uganda’s Health Minister, Ruhakana Rugunda, repeatedly for
comment, but received no reply.
Patients wait inside the TIENS store in Iganga. Credit: James Wan.

Patients wait inside the TIENS store in Iganga.

Apart from the story of the kidney patient, I didn’t come across other
rumours of deaths, but cases of the products not working as
miraculously as promised were easy to find. After all, TIENS products
are not medicines. Some of the company’s goods have been registered
with Uganda’s National Drugs Authority, but as ‘food & dietary
supplements’. In fact, stories of TIENS products not fully working
were even common amongst some of TIENS most ardent fans.

Back in Iganga, with the courtyard seminar over and Wasswa busy
talking to a small circle of attendees eager to hear more, Sarah*, 25,
moves towards the back of the courtyard closer to where I am sitting.

During the seminar, she had given testimony telling of how she’d taken
her baby boy, who was suffering from sickle cell anaemia, to several
hospitals before she came to TIENS. Many of those who told their
stories directed them matter-of-factly at Julius or Wasswa, but Sarah
had turned to face the crowd and spoken passionately as she’d
explained how the products worked wonders.

Asked a few more questions after the symposium, however, her story
reveals itself to be far less straightforward. It transpires that her
son is still ill. So ill, in fact, that she recently quit her nursing
job to look after him full-time. Sarah nevertheless insists that the
TIENS medicines work and says the reason her son is still suffering is
because his treatment is incomplete. She bought half the products the
boy needs for a full recovery but is struggling to find the money to
purchase the rest.

Robert, 30, tells a similar tale. He too claims to be a firm believer
in the healing powers of TIENS, and acted as my translator throughout
the seminar, seemingly on Wasswa’s instruction. Robert says that he
came to TIENS with kidney problems and maintains the products worked
where hospital treatments failed. Like Sarah’s son, however, he admits
that he is still in pain. Firstly, he attributes this to the fact that
his kidney treatment is incomplete; he too has had financial
difficulties. Secondly, he explains that the TIENS diagnostic test
revealed his kidneys are not his only problem; while his original
condition may have improved, he now knows he is suffering from other
conditions that need to be cured too.

Sarah and Robert reveal that they have each spent USH 460,000 ($180)
on products so far, paying in instalments from what they could borrow
or scrape together. Sarah says she needs USH 500,000 ($200) more to
complete her son’s treatment, but doesn’t know where the money will
come from given that she is now jobless and that the father of her son
is in school. Robert says he needs around USH 200,000 ($80) more, but
says that as a “peasant”, he too will struggle.

“I haven’t balanced it well,” he says, “but I hope it will balance out
soon. I am still feeling pain.”
TIENS seminar

Attendees gather to listen to Wasswa in the courtyard in Iganga.

It is not a coincidence that Robert, Sarah and a few others who spoke
to me had all purchased exactly USH 460,000 worth of products. Nor is
it an inexplicable peculiarity that individuals with no reliable
source of income had shelled out what little they had, and more, on
TIENS products. After all, TIENS is more than just a supplier of
health supplements.

In the symposium in Iganga, once Julius had waxed lyrical about
various products, it was time for Wasswa to take over the stage to
talk about another benefit of TIENS. Though not before Julius had the
opportunity to rouse the crowd.

After finishing his demonstration of TIENS’ disease-curing sanitary
pads, Julius put down the product and strolled ponderously along the
front of the courtyard before turning to face the audience. “Tianshi!”
he shouted suddenly. “Together we share!” came back the reply on cue,
a hundred voices amplified by the concrete walls. “Tianshi!” Julius
proclaimed a second time, a little louder. “One dream!” came the
soaring response. “Tianshi!” yelled the doctor a third time. “The best
of all!!” bellowed the crowd.

Next, Julius taught the audience a new trick. Since all points in ours
palms relate to different internal organs, he explained, clapping
stimulates the whole body and works as a kind of “first aid.” He held
his hands apart and, together with the crowd, clapped out a rhythm
that crackled across the courtyard. Julius explained that the louder
you clap, the greater the benefits to your internal organs, before
holding out his hands and going again. And again.

Finally, looking satisfied, Julius completed his session and handed
over to Wasswa.

“TIENS is not just good for your health,” the salesman proclaimed,
taking to the stage, “it is also good for your wealth. If you register
with TIENS, they will start to pay you. You come here for treatment,
but over time, you will start to get a salary.”

Over the next few minutes, Wasswa explained that this is what he had
done and that he was not only receiving thousands of dollars every
month now, but had been taken on international trips by the company,
received huge cash bonuses and been given a brand new car.

“When you reach a certain level, you start earning,” he said. “And it
does not matter if you have no qualifications or education. TIENS does
not care if you are educated. TIENS only cares how many products you
buy and how many people you recruit.”

Wasswa said these words with a weighty earnestness, but they were not
news to half the courtyard. Robert, Sarah and many others around them
− all recognisable by the golden lion-shaped badges they were wearing
− were not just TIENS patients, but members and distributors already.
They were here on Wasswa’s instructions to give testimony and help
convince others to join too. For these returning members, TIENS is not
just a medical supplier, but a livelihood, an investment, and a chance
to follow in Wasswa’s jet-setting footsteps.

−

Sitting behind his desk at the TIENS-Uganda headquarters, located at
the top of King Fahd Plaza on a busy street in Kampala, Kibuuka
Mazinga Ambrose is delighted to explain how the business model works
in more detail.

“Anyone can join,” says the company chairperson, wearing a bright
yellow TIENS-branded cap. “All you need to do is pay a small initial
fee of $20.” Once you have done this, you can buy products at
wholesale prices and sell them on at a profit. However, this is just
the start, he says. You don’t get rich by selling a few bottles of
herbal supplements. Under TIENS’ model, there are eight ranks and you
need to move up the levels to really start enjoying the benefits.

The first few levels can be reached simply by buying more products,
which essentially brings with it a small discount on goods. However,
to get to the bigger rewards, you need to start recruiting others.
This way, you receive a commission whenever they make purchases and
also get rewarded if they recruit their own followers.

The more people you recruit and the more they recruit in turn, the
higher you move up the rankings, and soon you can just sit back and
watch as the commissions roll in. Furthermore, once you’ve reached the
8-star level and keep growing your network, you will eventually become
a Bronze Lion, then a Silver Lion, then a Gold Lion, and enjoy rewards
of cash prizes, international trips, a brand new 4×4 car, a luxury
yacht, a private jet, and finally a “Luxurious Villa Palace.”

“It’s all about growing your network; their success is your success,”
says Ambrose cheerily. “TIENS does not care who you are. Anyone can do
it, and there is no limit on what you can earn.”

As the TIENS Guide puts it, joining the company means: “You stop
struggling financially,” there is “little risk of losing”, and “if you
work for 5 years you can retire.”
TIENS Guide

The TIENS-Uganda Information Guide explaining the business model.

According the company website, over 200,000 Ugandans have joined
TIENS, eclipsing even the number of government school teachers in the
country.

Given Uganda’s high rates of unemployment − youth unemployment is over
80% according to some estimates − the appeal of membership is clear to
see. Decent jobs are scarce and rags-to-riches stories like Wasswa’s
are even scarcer.

Furthermore, the company’s image is significantly helped by the
Ugandan government. Not only does TIENS advertise on the Health
Ministry’s calendar, but according to Wasswa, around ten MPs are
members of the company and at the Iganga seminar, Stephen Wante, the
mayor of Bugembe, made a guest appearance. In 2011 meanwhile,
Vice-President Edward Ssekandi officiated a ceremony in which a
distributor was awarded a car and organised for TIENS to donate some
of its products to a government health centre. A photograph of the
Ssekandi shaking hands with TIENS’ president also has pride of place
on the company website.

However, despite all of TIENS’ promises of wealth and perceived
legitimacy, actually making money from the scheme is virtually
impossible. At the TIENS headquarters, where members can print out
their balance sheets, many leave the office holding spreadsheets
indicating that they are owed almost nothing, if anything at all.
Meanwhile, back in Iganga, several members who had joined several
months ago, attended every biweekly seminar, bought lots of products,
and gone on recruitment drives, revealed that they had not earned any
notable income either. It seems many others have also abandoned the
scheme after finding they could not make it work.

According to most TIENS members − both those who are profiting and
those who aren’t − the reason for these failures is simple: the
individual did not work hard enough. When I asked Sarah why she
thought she hadn’t made any money after being a member for five
months, for example, she hesitated before Robert helpfully chipped in
to say “it means she is not performing well.” Yet Robert had barely
received any income either, despite having been a member for six
months and having recruited nine people. Other members who had yet to
make money also suggested their situation was down to bad luck or poor
performance.

This feeling was perhaps most starkly expressed after the seminar as I
spoke to Wasswa within earshot of three members, all of whom had been
distributors for up to six months yet not come anywhere close to
getting a decent income. I asked Wasswa how long it typically takes to
break even. “Some people can take a month, but sometimes maybe two
months,” he replied. What if someone has been working hard but hasn’t
started getting an income after 6 months, I followed up. “Six months?”
Wasswa exclaimed. “No, it’s rare. Very rare. If someone is serious,
they should be on a high level and earning well after six months.”

I looked over at the three recruits who all just stared at the floor,
looking sheepish and, I thought, ashamed.
Kampala store

The pharmacy in one of the stores in Kampala.

The reality, however, is that failure under TIENS is not the
individual’s fault. In fact, for the vast majority of members, the
business model is designed to fail. TIENS in Uganda appears to be
little more than thin-veiled pyramid scheme.

Recruiters emphasise that to join, all you need to do is pay a $20
membership fee. But in reality that is only the start. Members have to
buy products to move up the rankings and then continue to buy goods to
keep their accounts open.

Members could make money selling these products, but the idea of
shifting all these goods is a non-starter. Not only does each
distributor have to compete with 200,000 other sellers as well as 30
well-established stores, but it doesn’t even make economic sense for
customers to buy from individual members when they could sign up to
TIENS themselves and get much lower prices anyway.

This is perhaps why Wasswa and other recruiters barely even mention
selling products and why the emphasis instead is very heavily on
“growing your network.” The incentives for signing up new members are
higher than those for sales; the training sessions teach recruits how
to sell membership rather than goods; and the TIENS Guide’s main piece
of practical advice is a 6-step plan of how to “make a name list of at
least 100 in a shortest time possible.”

If not from selling products to the public then, the bulk of the money
in the TIENS system comes members’ own pockets as they pay to join,
pay to move up the rankings, and pay to keep their accounts open. And
it is this same money that finances top-level distributors’ huge
salaries, shiny new cars and trips around the world. Given all the
money in the system comes from members, the only way this tiny elite
profits is because the rest of Uganda’s 200,000 members do not.

TIENS refer to itself as a ‘multi-level marketing’, but in reality it
seems to be an unsustainable and fraudulent pyramid scheme designed to
extract money from the many to pay the salaries of a few.

I later contacted Ambrose, Wasswa and Jamba George, another 8-star
recruiter, for their response to these allegations, but they all
declined. The manager of TIENS-Uganda, a Chinese expatriate, and the
company’s global headquarters in Tianjin did not make a comment
either.

It should also be noted that TIENS is not just in Uganda, nor is it
the only scheme of its kind. The American firms Forever Living and
GNLD also deal in health supplements and follow a multi-level
marketing model, while TIENS’ presence on the continent seems to be
particularly strong in West Africa, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe. It is
further notable that TIENS has offices in many Western countries,
though the products there seem to be marketed more directly as mere
food supplements.

−

Back in the courtyard in Iganga, Robert is listing the products he was
prescribed six months ago. Like so many others faced with Uganda’s
struggling healthcare system, Robert ended up seeking alternatives and
eventually ended up at Wasswa’s busy but welcoming clinic.

The products worked, Robert insists. Up to a point. He just wishes, he
says, that he could finish the treatment and be fully cured of his
kidney problems as well as the other health conditions detected by the
diagnostic test he underwent. But he cannot afford it.

Robert has no other jobs − he says there are hardly any jobs available
in the area − and has five children to support. When he joined the
company half a year ago, he thought TIENS was the answer to all his
prayers, but he is still in pain and deeper in debt.

“Money is a problem, he says. “It is not easy to recruit people and I
spend USH12,000 ($5) every week on transport to come to these
seminars.”

I ask him why he is still part of the company despite losing money
each week. He pauses for a moment before answering, “I believe I will
balance my accounts soon. And I am close to moving up to the next
level when I will be able to earn more.”

He explains that a technical misunderstanding delayed him moving up a
rank, but that it should be sorted out soon. I point out that even if
he moves up a level and earns slightly more than now, he will still be
earning a tiny fraction of what he has invested. He nods in agreement,
but adds, with a faint smile, “But with TIENS, time is on your side.”

But what if it still doesn’t work out, I push. What if Wasswa is the
exception that proves the rule? What if it never works out?

Robert looks me in the eye for a few seconds before gazing out across
the courtyard where a few groups of attendees are still standing
around chatting.

“If the money defeats me, ” he says quietly, turning back to me, “I
will disappear.”

*some names have been changed to protect interviewees’ identities.

James Wan is editor of African Arguments. He was an associate producer
on the Aljazeera documentary Uganda’s Health Pyramid. He is a fellow
of the China-Africa Reporting Project, managed by University of
Witwatersrand. Follow him on twitter at @jamesjwan.

Some quick notes:

‘Robert’ in the article is actually named Michael Halungu. His
identity was protected on publication but he has since renounced the
company and is interviewed in the Aljazeera documentary.
For an update on what happened following the investigation see here.

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3 thoughts on “Get Rich or Die Trying: The Chinese multinational
scamming millions from Ugandans”

Elias Gebreselassie says:
February 1, 2017 at 12:38 pm

Tiens also has similar track record in Ethiopia. although it’s
scam was detected early and the chief scammers put to trial, many
people lost money and their minds to this pyramid scheme
Steph says:
February 1, 2017 at 6:00 pm

Do something about your App African rguments. You get timed out
before you finish a single sentence. Plus we are not good at numbers
do us a big favour and rethink ur App. Thx
Steph says:
February 1, 2017 at 6:09 pm

Thank you for your efforts. Uganda is being led by corrupt bush
men who lack exposure one, two, anything Chinese is an opportunity to
make money as far as they re concerned!
Three, a very large percentage of Ugandans is very ignorant. Four,
you can get in trouble for sensitising the masses about Tiens by the
very politicians who are behind such chinese bussinesses, investors,
as they are known in Ug today!