As Ikpeazu, others fret over Abia's forensic audit, missing airport

Source: New Telegraph
Author: New Telegraph

The Abia State Governor, Dr. Alex Otti shone, glowed and dazzled like a diamond on Friday, April 19, as he basked in the spotlight of the international lecture stage, at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, in the United States of America. Taking the podium inside the hallowed JHU Bloomberg Centre, on Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC, Governor Otti engaged his audience in an intriguing lecture, where he spoke on, 'State Governance and Economic Transition: Meeting the Challenges'. The Johns Hopkins lecture was one of the series of activities lined up in the governor's schedule, while on a trip put together by some prominent Nigerians and citizens of Abia State in the US diaspora. Among those in the audience were Professor Pat Utomi, Professor Kingsley Moghalu, Professor Jim Steinberg, Professor Peter Lewis, Dr. Eme Okoro, Councilor of Bowie, Maryland, Roxy Ndebumadu; the Mayor of Isialangwa South in Abia State and Dr. Nwambuisi Elelenta Elele among others.

Even though Governor Otti had forewarned his audience, especially those from outside of Nigeria, not to expect something new from his paper as, according to him, the world was already familiar with the story of Nigeria, the Governor, however, left his audience in utter bewilderment shortly into his speech, when he revealed the findings of an audit firm he had engaged to look into the finances of the state, shortly after he assumed office. Hear him: "It is a difficult thing to admit, but a lot of leaders, who get involved in politics and contest elections, go there for reasons other than serving the people. "Talking about corruption, I had set up a forensic audit as soon as I took over office in Abia, last year (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. "So, some N9.3 billion was paid to seven contractors for contracts that were not executed at all up till today. Another N15.9 billion (N16 billion) was paid to 63 contractors with no supporting documents anywhere in the state. 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. So, as we continue to look for our airport, we have also told the security agencies to help us search.

"When you juxtapose that with pensions that were lying unpaid for about 10 years and the salary arrears, just one of these headings, the N10 billion that was spent to build a non-existent airport, was exactly the amount of money our government used to take off the pension arrears. "So lack of accountability as we know enables the mindless stealing of resources from the people, impoverishes the populace, promotes incompetence and damages trusts in public institutions. If any evidence is needed to buttress this claim, the fact that several states in the country struggle to pay salaries and pensions, is all the proof one needs that the absence of accountability in the management of public resources does great harm to the people." Expectedly, Governor Otti's shocking disclosure immediately dominated the media space. An unofficial video clip, extracted from the governor's presentation, soon hit social media platforms and went viral. Even though the governor was careful not to personalise the issues as he merely gave a glimpse into the audit report, the immediate past governor of the state, Okezie Ikpeazu, and his group on their own assumed culpability. Perhaps, like they say, "the guilty are afraid". Ikpeazu and his gang characteristically unleashed their venom at Governor Otti. The former governor, who had engaged in shadow fight against his successor since leaving office and after failing to install his puppet, deployed his loquacious aides to hurl insults and abuses at Governor Otti for daring to do his job credibly. He failed to address the issues other than shouting himself hoarse. This has been the ex-governor's surreptitious way of trying to rewrite his story of abysmal performance in governance; a story that is thrown up in sharp and unmistakable contrast to the widely-acclaimed extraordinary gains of his successor in barely 10 months on the same seat.