*Orbih parading forged documents — Information Commissioner
By Gabriel Enogholase
THE Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Edo State has accused Governor Adams Oshiomhole of spending N142million to commission some projects executed by his administration by the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), and Sen. Bola Tinubu, the National Leader of the party.
State chairman of the party, Chief Dan Orbih, made allegation at Igboubazuwa, headquarters of Ovia South West Local Government Area, during a rally organized to welcome defectors from the APC to the PDP,
The rally was attended by PDP leaders including Senator Roland Owie, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu and Solomon Edebiri.
He displayed two Edo State Government vouchers with number EXT/GOV/GHSP/2441/14 and EXT/GOV/GHSP/2477/14, which, he said, were used to sign out the sum of N76 and N66 million respectively for the commissioning of projects on November 28 and 29, 2014.
APC-toon
He said, “Governor Oshiomhole sat in his office and signed two vouchers to commission projects on 28th and 29th November. In those vouchers, it was written, ‘voucher to commission projects in Edo State by two eminent Nigerians, Retired General Muhammadu Buhari and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’. In those vouchers, the sum of N76 and N66 million were signed away simply to cut tapes for projects that had earlier been commissioned.
“How can a government sign away N142 million just for Buhari and Tinubu to come to cut tape? Never before in the history of this state had we witnessed this level of misappropriation of public fund.
However, Special Adviser to Governor Adams Oshiomhole on Media Affairs, Prince Kassim Afegbua, described Orbih’s allegation as spurious, saying, “Do we run Edo State Government in PDP secretariat? Anybody can cook up memos but I am not aware that our memos are missing”. The State Commissioner for Information, Mr. Louis Odion, in another reaction, described the vouchers paraded by the PDP Chairman as forged.
Odion, in a statement, yesterday, said: “With Comrade Adams Oshiomhole commissioning world-class projects all over Edo State in the last two months, we knew PDP would be gnashing their deformed teeth in envy. But we least expected malice would push them into forging vouchers to back up a shameless lie in their evil desperation to tarnish Oshiomhole’s golden records.
“But Edo people are not deceived. They know their governor is a very prudent man. That is why even today, whereas PDP-led Federal Government is owing workers arrears of salaries despite cornering whopping 52 percent of federation account, Edo is not owing workers.
“The joke is on Edo PDP. With less than six weeks to the general elections, it is laughable that PDP, rather than show remorse by first apologising to Edo people for under-developing the state for 10 years, has resorted to peddling fake vouchers for a transaction that exists only in their crooked imagination. It is very cheap indeed.”
Commenting on the 2015 presidential election, Orbih said that it was the responsibility of all sons and daughters of the South-South, irrespective of their political affiliation, to rally round President Goodluck Jonathan so that he would bring more development to the zone and the country at large.
Some of the APC members who defected to the PDP at the rally included a former APC coordinator in the council, Comrade Ricediahard Igorigo, Chief Richard Digho and an Ijaw youths leader, Samson Yanbor, who said he left the APC after one of the losers in the party’s House of Representatives primary in Ovia Federal Constituency was made winner.
vanguard
