Unfortunately, any idea you would have for achieving this would never be verifiable, because you wouldn't be able to confirm it actually worked.

I think, if we are being honest here, the only way to actually confirm & be sure your execution of an idea worked is to travel there & meet him in person.

Needless to say, this is not a good idea & considering he is already working illegally, it might be very dangerous to have contact with someone who is part of a scammer gang or mafia.

Even, if you would videochat with him & he would show you some stuff he needs to buy & then shows you what he supposedly bought, it still can be a trick or whatever. Or maybe it's much cheaper than he told you & the rest of the money went into whatever you didn't want him to spend it on.

If you are that convinced he is truly begging out of sheer necessity, then show him Fiverr & that anyone can earn money for doing the easiest & smallest things.

If he outright rejects it & is not interested, it's pretty much clear, he's not interested in getting money for work or otherwise out of pure necessity, because if you really need every single penny to live, you would take on any job offer, ever.

People in the West cannot even imagine what's going on in those regions.

For example, there is a mineral mining company in Africa, which literally, no joke, has a department for ransom money.

It is so much daily business for them to have workers from them kidnapped, that the company has a literal ransom money department, to pay off kidnappers efficiently & quickly, to get back those workers.