Imo was corrupt under Okorocha, monarch declares

• State assembly passes seven bills
Chairman of the Imo State Council of Traditional Rulers, HRM Eze Samuel Agunwa Ohiri, has said the state under the immediate past administration of Governor Rochas Okorocha was corrupt.

He stated this while speaking with journalists shortly after the meeting of stakeholders and leaders of thought at his palace in Owerri yesterday.

The monarch said Okorocha has no reason to lay claims to the recent report of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which adjudged Imo as the least corrupt state in the country.

He explained that Imo was ranked 35 under Okorocha, which implied that the state was corrupt, adding that the former governor ran the state without recourse to the indices upon which the report was based.

Ohiri added that the indices include rule of law, due process, fiscal discipline, openness in governance, accountability and transparency.

When these people come, they look for transparency, honesty, fiscal discipline, rule of law and due process in governance.

“The last time they came, they looked at all these things and perhaps they didn’t see them. But now, they saw transparency, rule of law, fiscal discipline, openness and thought out plans.

“They saw that the government is going on in a honest, proper and decent manner. They saw that the government is doing things in an orderly manner and that the officials were following due process. That is what they met on ground and that is what they graded Imo State on,” he stated.

Meanwhile, the state House of Assembly, presided over by its Speaker, Dr. Chijioke Collins, has passed seven executive bills after necessary legislative processes.

Clean copies of the bills would be presented to the Imo State Governor, Emeka Ihedioha for his assent.

They are, A Bill for a Law to Supplement (Re- order) the 2019 Budget with N44.3b for the Year Ending December 31, 2019, and other Related Purposes; A Bill for a Law to Amend the Law Revision Committee Law 2006 (Law Number 2 of 2006) (Report of Committee on Judiciary); A Bill for a Law to Establish The Imo State Water Supply and Sewages Corporate and other Matters Incident Thereto, among others.