On the heels of the March 28 Presidential election, in which President
Goodluck Jonathan lost his re-election bid, the Presidency is reportedly
going after politicians who collected huge money but did not deliver
their Local Governments.
On the heels of the March 28 Presidential election, in which
President Goodluck Jonathan lost his re-election bid, Punch is authoritatively
reporting that investigation launched by the incumbent reveals that politicians
and government officials spent millions of naira meant for election campaigns
and ‘errands’ on luxury properties.
The President, who is said to have released over N2 trillion
in cash to campaign coordinators, ministers, special advisers, close aides and
friends, support groups and traditional rulers, is bothered that most of the
people could not even deliver their polling booths and local governments.
“The President was said to have been further irked by the
results of an investigation he ordered. The probe showed that some coordinators
used campaign funds to buy very expensive properties, especially in Abuja, and
luxury cars. Some of the funds have also been traced to the bank accounts of
senior party and government officials who were charged with the disbursement of
funds to voters and groups,” Punch report reads in part.
According to the report, Jonathan has also set up a
committee of five to ensure the funds are recovered. But a source in the
Presidency however told the newspaper that, a close associate of the President
said getting the money back would be difficult.
It also contained that funds given to traditional rulers
across the country will not be asked for, but that the President is bent on
making his ministers, close aides and special advisers refund the monies
collected.
The source said; “Some ministers did not get less than N20bn
each. None of them can deny it because this fact isn’t hidden within government
circles. The only problem with such monies is that there is no receipt to show
that they collected money. The sad part is that almost all of them performed
woefully. Even in the states where the PDP won, some ministers could not
deliver 100,000 votes. They could not mobilise their people to come out. The
President is not happy. They all went property and car shopping. This was the
most expensive election in the history of this country, yet there was no
result.
“The sad part was that even after the President lost on
March 28, more money was given to all of them to make up for the dismal outing
by winning their states during the April 11 elections. But that turned out to
be a bad decision because apart from losing the governorship election, we
didn’t perform well at the National Assembly and House of Representatives
polls.
“They must give an account of the money since they didn’t
use it for the election. The President is not particular about the funds spent
on genuine campaign needs like the hiring of jets, advertisements and the rest
that also cost billions of naira. His focus is on the individuals that
collected billions to deliver their states but couldn’t even win their polling
booths.”
According to Punch, apart from the N20 billion given to some
key ministers and senior special advisers, especially in states where the PDP hoped
to capture from the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), some
pro-Jonathan support groups received about N16bn.
Confirming the cash distribution, a senior member of the PDP
also told the newspaper that “Lagos was a show of shame.”
The insider said; “A few days to the governorship poll,
about $150m was received in cash by about five top campaign coordinators. But
they failed again, even more than we did in the presidential poll because we
lost some areas we won on March 28 to the APC on April 11. They were to share
this money to the local governments and the masses.
“Please understand me, I am saying that the sum of $150m was
just for the governorship election in Lagos. We are not talking about the sums
they got for the presidential election. Only one out of the five people that
shared the money gave some of it to local government chairmen. This person
disbursed about N2bn. The rest of them sat on the money.
“The coordinator that collected the sum of $50m later went
to a Federal Government agency and complained of not having enough funds for
the election and got an additional $20m. The story is the same in almost all
the South-West especially Oyo, Osun, and the northern states. A female minister
from the North, who got the highest amount of funds for that region, lost her
state in a shameful manner.”
However, the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Olisa
Metuh, distanced the party from the cash disbursement.
“The national leadership of the PDP is not aware of any
campaign fund. We were not part of it and therefore we can’t be asked to
account for what we didn’t know anything about," he said.“There was a
campaign committee and only the committee is in the position to account for any
fund.”
The committee set up to retrieve the monies has been said to
be unsuccessful so far, as the beneficiaries are not cooperating.
The President is reportedly focusing on the South-West and
northern states.
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