Former governor of Imo State, Senator Rochas Okorocha, has countered the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in its claim that it seized N7.9 billion from bank accounts linked to him.
In a statement on Thursday by his media aide, Sam Onwuemeodo, the Imo West senator dared the anti-graft agency to publish the accounts’ details where the said money was recovered from.
Head of the Port Harcourt zone of the EFCC, Usman Imam, had said at a press conference on Thursday that he recovered N7.9 billion from Okorocha and that over N5 billion had been returned to successive administrations.
Mr Imam also revealed that the former governor would be arraigned after investigations are concluded.
“The EFCC as a commission or Mr Usman Imam as a person and Head of Enugu zone then, and today, that of Port Harcourt Zone, of the commission, never recovered N7.9 billion or any other amount of money, from Rochas Okorocha,” the statement by his aide read.
“With this denial, we, therefore, challenge EFCC or Mr Imam as the one who made the claim, to prove us wrong by publishing details of the bank accounts the money was found and the owners of the accounts.
“We hold the EFCC and its personnel in very high esteem. And we expect the commission or Mr. Imam to take our denial very serious, because Nigerians of goodwill would like to know who is saying the truth or who is lying.
“Where the commission finds out that it had misinformed the public and had also blackmailed the former Imo governor, perhaps unconsciously, we expect the commission or Mr. Imam to do the needful, which is to retract the media statement and then tell Nigerians the correct story. The N7.9 billion in question must be in bank accounts. Let the EFCC publish the accounts’ details without delay.”
The statement further challenged the EFCC to publish the ex-governor’s houses in Owerri and Abuja which it said had been seized.
