DETAILS ON THE ARREST OF OGUN STATE SPEAKER

Nigeria’s anti-graft agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has arrested the Speaker of the Ogun State House of Assembly, Olakunle Oluomo.

Oluomo was arrested Thursday morning at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos and taken to the office of the agency at Ikoyi, Lagos for questioning.

It was learnt that the Speaker failed to honour invitations.

Efforts to reach the spokesperson for the agency, Wilson Uwajaren on the phone for further details were not successful.

In January 2022, EFCC invited Oluomo for questioning over alleged Financial Misappropriation, Forgery And Money Laundering.

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 reference No: CR:3000/EFCC/LS/CMU/OG1/VOL.1/004, and obtained by newsmen, the EFCC asked the Speaker to 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 follows.”

It had been reported that the Speaker was being investigated by the anti-graft agency along with the Assembly Clerk and some former members of the House.

In another letter obtained then by newsmen, the EFCC had asked the clerk to provide it with information on all budget appropriations and allocations of the House from May 30, 2015, to 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 newsmen.

“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 the 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.”

A lawmaker in late 2021 told newsmen that the Speaker had been bragging that “nothing would come out of the EFCC investigation.”

He added that the documents Oluomo in collaboration with the House Clerk submitted to the anti-graft agency were fake.

“Things have been quiet from the side of EFCC and the Speaker has been bragging that nothing will come out of it,” the lawmaker had told SaharaReporters.

“Kindly check these documents he and the Clerk of the House submitted to EFCC to cover up how they embezzled N95million monthly allocation, these documents contained fake signatures of principal officers.

“There are still more documents also containing forged signatures of all honorable members. Most of the Honourable members and principal officers are yet to know that monies are been signed out in their names.

“In addition, hundreds of fictitious hotel invoices and gas station invoices were part of the retired receipt they submitted to EFCC. You can even see that the signatures on the two documents don’t even match. Yet, none of them is the true signatures of these honorable members.”