•Olanusi: governor ‘is a personification of corruption’
Impeached Ondo State Deputy Governor Ali Olanusi said yesterday he has written a petition to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to probe allegations of corruption against Governor Olusegun Mimiko.
He urged “indigenes and patriotic Nigerians to beam a searchlight” on the activities of the governor, alleging that he had derailed.
The septuagenarian politician, who returned to his native Akoko with his associates, rejected the allegation of gross misconduct leveled against him, before he was impeached by the House of Assembly.
Reiterating his innocence, Olanusi, who is now the leader of the state All Progressives Congress (APC), alleged that Mimiko was a personification of corruption.
He told reporters in Lagos before departing home that Mimiko failed to paint him as a corrupt deputy after he rejected the governor’s plan to run Ondo State as a sole administrator.
Olanusi said the “one-day impeachment drama” against him underscored the personality of the governor as a corrupt politician.
The former deputy governor said if the anti-graft agency failed to investigate the allegations, the alleged looting would continue.
Olanusi alleged that N80 billion debts and borrowing have pushed the state into stagnation.
He urged the people, including civil servants, “to gird their loins”.
The way forward, he added, was for the people to propose a closure to the “corruption of the government” and insist on the “recovery of the stolen and looted funds”.
Olanusi added: “I urged civil servants and the people of Ondo State to help prevent further theft of our resources and step up this engagement by documenting credible reports of corruption going on in high places within the government.”
The former deputy governor noted that his warnings and advice to the governor delayed the drift, stressing that the administration regressed into a gale of forgery and falsification of financial records and documents when he stopped listening to his wise counsels.
Olanusi challenged the governor to dispute the claim of forgery and falsification of the State Oil-producing Area Development Commission (OSOPADEC) Appropriation Law 2014, which he said, led to the alleged squandering of N18 billion meant for frontline services and the implementation of people-oriented programmes in riverine communities.
He said the governor should clear the air on the alleged forgery and falsification of 2014 Re-Ordered Budget to cover N6.7 billion, which, he alleged, was channeled into specialised conduit-pipes.
Other allegations made by Olanusi included the alleged falsification of the House of Assembly resolution authorising the borrowing of N2.4 billion for the Wealth Creation Agency (WECA), the diversion of money meant for the Residency Card Project by the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), the manipulation of the N27 billion bond and diversion of its proceeds without the Security and Exchange Commission’s (SEC’s) approval and falsification of records of the House of Assembly on his impeachment.
Olanusi added: “The more you look, the more you see tactical incursion, divorced from the machinery of an elected government that seeks to undo checks and balances created to protect the supremacy of parliament and the independence of the judiciary.”
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