Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Nigeria’s anti-graft agency, has summoned Olakunle Oluomo, the Speaker of the Ogun State House of Assembly, for interrogation for suspected financial misappropriation, forgery, and money laundering.
According to a reports, EFCC had earlier in a letter dated December 9, 2021, with a reference No: CR:3000/EFCC/LS/CMU/OG1/VOL.3/165, asked Oluomo to report to its Lagos office but the Speaker had claimed he was working “on the 2022 budget presented by Governor Dapo Abiodun.”
However, in another letter dated January 05, 2022 with a reference No: CR:3000/EFCC/LS/CMU/OG1/VOL.1/004, the EFCC asked the Speaker report to its office along with the Accountant and Director of Finance and Account for questioning.
The letter read, “The commission’s letter with reference number CR, 3000/EFCC/LS/CMU/OG1/VOL.3/165 dated 9th December 2021 and your response of 13th December 2021 on the above subject, refer.
“In view of the above, you are kindly requested to report along with the accountant and Director of Finance and Account for the pending interview with the undersigned through the Head, Chairman’s monitoring Unit as follow”.
It had earlier been reported that the Speaker was being investigated by the anti-graft agency with the Assembly clerk and some former members of the House.
In another letter, the EFCC had asked the clerk to provide it with information on all budget appropriations and allocations of the House from May 30, 2015 till date.
“The Speaker and others are under probe for different allegations. First one is financial misappropriation. About N85,000,000 monthly for running cost of the Assembly cannot be accounted for since June 2019 till date by Mr Speaker and Clerk, the approving officer and accounting officer respectively,” a lawmaker had told reporters.
“This led to a rift between the Speaker and the recently impeached Deputy Speaker after the latter demanded accountability and transparency. Even doing Covid-19 lockdown, running costs such as local/international travel, cost for fuelling the generator were diverted to private accounts.
“Diversion of constituency allowance funds (each member of the 8th Assembly collected N20,000,000 twice between 2015-2019. Most of the retired receipts were forged and fictitious pictures of purported ghost projects were filed by members. The current Speaker and 3 other current members were part of the 8th Assembly under investigation. A current Special Adviser to the Governor of Ogun state who also has a school certificate scandal case over him, was part of the 8th Assembly under the EFCC radar.
“Forgery of Financial Bills (i-The House passed a resolution to approve only N75 billion Bond for the State Government sometime in June 2020, but Speaker secretly falsified the content of the resolution letter in favour of the Executive, changed it to N200 billion after members had already passed and signed resolution for just N75 billion on the floor of the House before the camera.
“Speaker falsified some contents {S.7(4)} of Ogun State Legislative Funds Management Bill, after passage, for personal/selfish grounds. After the passage on the floor of the House, he falsified the contents in his favour before sending a clean copy to the Government for assent.
“Speaker in connivance with Mr Clerk, also falsified the current Standing Order of the House before the commencement of the 9th Assembly, to favour his election as the Speaker and disqualified others to contest, amongst other contents.”
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