Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State has
accused a former Minister of Finance and
Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Ngozi
Okonjo-Iweala, of illegally withdrawing $1 billion
from the federation account to prosecute the re-
election bid of former President Goodluck
Jonathan.
Speaking at a Seminar organized by the Edo state
government for Permanent Secretaries, Directors
and Deputy Directors entitled “enhancing IGR in
Edo, issues, prospects and challenges”, the
governor said the former minister also needs to
tell Nigerians how the Excess Crude Account was
drawn down to $4.1 billion from the peak of $10
billion when no approval was given by the
National Economic Council for any withdrawals.
The governor said Mrs. Okonjo-Iweala would
have been declared a pathological liar if she were
a witness in court due to the inconsistencies in
her statements.
He said a forensic audit would truly determine
how much was illegally spent from the federation
account under her watch as Minister.
He said the state government would now hold
Permanent Secretaries, Directors and Deputy
Directors responsible for any fraud detected in
their departments saying the government has
trimmed down the cost of running government.
He said: “the truth is, many things went wrong
even at the federal level. As you might have read
in the papers, while the federal government, under
Goodluck Jonathan, with the then Coordinating
Minister of the Economy liked to blame
“Governors” for wasteful spending, for not saving
for the rainy day, for not investing properly, the
truth is the real weakness in the Nigerian federal
chain has been the Federal Government.
“Our hope is that with the new President, given
his pedigree, we will break from the past.
“As I’m sure you will soon begin to hear when all
the numbers are published, last week, I
complained aloud that Edo State lost about N10
billion over a four year period from only one
source: the NLNG remittance to the federation
account.
“How did I arrive at the figure? I used my 4-
Figure Table and I asked myself at $2.1 billion
remitted by NLNG as taxes and Shell, and by the
way, Shell is not the only oil operative, we have
Chevron and several others. They shared the $2.1
billion based on the revenue allocation formula,
Edo State got about N2.27 billion. So I said,
thank God this money came after the departure of
Okonjo-Iweala and President Jonathan. If the
PDP were still in charge in Abuja, this money
would have been taken.
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