By NewsCritic Reporters
Before the Abia State Governor Dr Alex Otti approved the forensic audit of the state’s finances following the rot he met in office, blame was being laid on the doorstep of known political godfathers in the State.
In the opinion of many of the former governor Okezie Ikpeazu’s lackeys, “one of the causes of the seeming failure of the Ikpeazu’s administration was the overbearing influence of the godfathers, who they claimed was actually in control of the State’s finances.
They spurn a yarn about how they limited the former governor from performing and meeting other obligations like payment of salaries and pensions, portraying Ikpeazu as being helpless and deserving pity because he was tied to the apron strings of his mentors.
However, these allegations have turned out to be baseless and concocted lies in the face of the damning forensic audit report which proved to the contrary. The widespread political drama that has trailed the Forensic Audit Report findings between the Abia State Gov Alex Otti and his predecessor in office Okezie Ikpeazu may not abate any time soon. This is because the incumbent Gov Otti has vowed that he would leave no stone unturned until all the stolen funds as revealed by the audit report are returned to the state coffers.
Former Gov Ikpeazu, who has before now tried to portray himself as the caged governor, who couldn’t meet up with most of his constitutional duties as governor, because some people took advantage of him is now running helter-skelter with the help of aides to exonerate himself of any official malfeasance or wrongdoing, while in office. A task that may prove difficult for him and his aides given the quantum of evidence against them.
Interestingly, the more he (Okezie Ikpeazu) tries to absolve himself of financial malpractices or twist the logic, the more the evidences of dishonest and illegal conduct by a public official are arrayed against his administration. “The evidences of brazen looting and stealing of public funds by the then Gov Okezie Ikpeazu’s administration was mind blowing”, said Chief Jones Madumere, a concerned citizen.
It was while speaking at the John Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, United States of America on the topic “State Governance and Economic Transition: Meeting Challenges”, that Gov Otti decided to let the cat out of the bag.
The governor said “talking about corruption, I had set up a forensic audit as soon as I took over office in Abia in 2023. So that there won’t be any argument, I called in one of the top three audit firms in the world, and not too long ago, they turned in their report and some of the things in their report are frightening, Otti disclosed.
He said “so, some N9.3billion was paid to seven contractors for contracts that were not executed at all up till today. Another N15.9 billion was paid to 63 contractors with no supporting documents anywhere in the state.
Again, Gov Otti disclosed that “another N12 billion was paid to two contractors for contracts that do not exist. Out of this figure, N10 billion was on September 25, 2020, paid to a contractor for the construction of the Abia State Airport. We have spent time trying to locate the airport and up till now have not been able to locate it…; Otti said that the N10 billion that was spent to build non-existent airport, was exactly the amount of money our government used to take off the pension arrears”.
This is the Okezie Ikpeazu many people didn’t know until recently that the audit report unveiled him, and exposed his shenanigans with Abia State funds. Ferdinand Ekeoma Special Adviser media to Gov Otti, lambasted Ikpeazu and his aides for attacking concerned Abians who are seeking for the recovery of the N10 billion spent on non-existent airport project.
He wondered how the Ikpeazu led government could transfer N10 billion to Ferotex Construction Company almost a month before approaching the House of Assembly for approval, and the none approval of the said N10 billion by the same House of Assembly for road construction when “a group of Traditional Rulers” now convinced the former Governor not to go ahead with the airport project. He said that Ikpeazu’s claim in a video interview that he used the fund for the completion of road projects is false, completely false”.
Chuks Omesie (Chuks Digits) a public affairs commentator and writer, in his piece on the report, pointed out that ”this forensic audit released by Gov Otti is an eye opener, it reveals a lot of things and at the same time refutes some of the beliefs that many have had in the past about certain godfathers, who many people try to criminalized in their minds”.
He imagined “how they presented the construction of an airport for the state and used it to loot the sum of N10 billion, and you can imagine the names of the construction companies and their directors to whom Ikpeazu awarded the contracts, I think, until now, you would have expected to see the names of the as stakeholders in the companies that were awarded the contracts, but that’s not the case, Chuks Digits reasoned.
Chuks Omesie noted that based on the latest audit report, it would be difficult not to conclude that it was like Okezie Ikpeazu looted the state with his friends and brothers, but they used the perceived godfathers name as a scapegoat” and made.
He challenged that “if that’s not what happened, please refute me with broader facts. They deceived the public into believing that he was held hostage, while in the real sense they are the ones who committed most of the embezzlement of state resources”, he explained.
This goes a long way in defining Ikpeazu as a silent betrayer, who deserves to take all the blame and face the law if found guilty.
For Gov Otti, his interest is in recovering the stolen funds and he said this much during his monthly media interactive session at the banquet hall Government House Umuahia.
In response to a question about the audit report, he stressed that the 360-page KPMG audit report would be published soon, and it was indeed published.
“The rest of the work will be done by the security agencies…we’re not interested in anyone going to jail, all we are after is to recover the diverted funds, Otti said.
