PDP threatens court action as Afegbua drags Secondus to EFCC, ICPC

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), yesterday, said it was contemplating court action against one of its members, Kassim Afegbua, for dragging its National Chairman, Uche Secondus, to Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Offences Commission (ICPC) over alleged N10 billion fraud.

Afegbua had, yesterday, submitted a petition to the EFCC and ICPC in Abuja seeking serious investigation of the management of the party’s finances.

In the petition, Afegbua asked the anti-graft agencies to scrutinise the N10 billion that allegedly accrued to PDP from 2017 till date, especially the money that accrued from sale of nomination forms for presidential, gubernatorial, House of Assembly and senatorial elections.

In a swift reaction, PDP, at a press conference addressed by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, described Afegbua’s allegation as spurious and irresponsible.

The party said it did not raise “Afegbua’s fictitious sum of N10 billion” as alleged by him.

“For avoidance of doubt, PDP generated N4.6 billion and raised a budget for its expenditure, in line with all known financial regulations of our party.

“This budget passed through the organs of our party and received the approvals from the NWC, Governors’ Forum, Board of Trustees as well as other organs of the party.

“As a law-abiding political party that respects the doctrine of rule of law and transparency, the budget was presented to the National Executive Committee (NEC) where it also received a final approval,” Ologbondiyan explained.

“Having said that, as a political party, under whose administration the EFCC and the ICPC were formulated and established, our party strictly adheres to best practices of transparency, accountability and probity in all issues, including our financial administration,” PDP stressed.

The party said it had since submitted the audited account of its financial expenditures for 2019 to Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in line with requirements of the law.

The opposition PDP said it would not in any way be distracted from the salient issues of insecurity and drooping economy trailing the failures of the All Progressives Congress (APC) administration to provide good governance.