Declare your assets publicly or we will publish it, SDP tells Aregbesola
The Social Democratic Party (SDP), Osun State has demanded that the state governor, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola should declare his assets publicly without delay or the party would be forced to publish what it knows about his alleged massive wealth.
SDP described Aregbesola’s defence on how he had spent several billions of the state funds as a mere rhetoric, laughable and inconsistent going by the facts in its possession.
The state SDP disclosed that it has conducted its private investigations and discovered how the governor had allegedly acquired enormous assets in the last four years in a state where millions of indigenes are living in abject poverty.
The Chairman of the party, Mr. Ademola Ishola in his speech during the party’s Performance Assessment meeting held in Osogbo at the weekend to deliberate on how SDP performed in the last National Election said what his party uncovered about Aregbesola’s wealth would stun Nigerians.
“Our party discovered that one of the areas where fraud was being perpetrated by Aregbesola’s government was through consultants handling virtually all his projects.
“It is a shame that even if the governor wanted to buy toothpicks, it has to pass through consultants, some of who are his cronies.
“In our investigation, two individuals must be held responsible for so many things and we are ready to assist EFCC or ICPC in this regard. We fingered former Commissioner for Finance, Dr. Wale Bolorunduro and Aregbesola’s ex-Special Adviser on Security, Mr. Adekunle Amos.
“To help us in this state, one Muiz Banire and another person by name, Lai Muhammed also benefitted immensely from Osun state. We are not accusing them of any wrongdoing but those individuals must be quizzed as well by any of the anti-graft agencies over their involvement in some contracts in the state”, he stated.
Ishola further explained that the governor’s monthly N500 million security votes and the N32 million monthly earmarked for the governor’s wife feeding allowance became worrisome for SDP.
“For now, the governor had pocketed over N25 billion as security votes while about N1.7 billion had gone for food in his house from our meager resources.
“While the governor has not failed once to take his security votes every month from the consolidate funds, retirees whose pensions are to be paid from the same account had not received theirs in the last seven months. Records as at May showed that 242 of the retirees lost their lives within this period.
“Simply put, Osun is today paralyzed with all government activities at stand still. The governor has virtually left the state for us to slug it out with poverty and hunger”, he said.
The state SDP boss stated that his party will not rest until everything in the state is straightened out by the All Progressives Congress (APC) led government at the federal level.
Ishola threatened that his party knew where Aregbesola’s assets both within and outside the state were and “we are ready to publish same including his heavy bank account”.
