- Delta APC Accuse Governor of ‘Moral Deficiency Syndrome’
By Pleasure Onohwakpo
Less than two weeks to the end of his tenure Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State has been serially lambasted for getting the State Assembly to pass a supplementary budget of N71 billion.
The governor has earlier received similar criticism for allegedly planning to inflate the Delta State Pension Bill for Ex Governors among which he will soon belong.
Mr Charles Aniagwu, The Delta State Commissioner for Information, denied the governor did anything wrong insisting that Okowa did not sign any new pension benefits package.
Governor Okowa’s regime which has been haunted by rumours of corruption, including accusations that he sold off the state’s liaison office in Lagos, came under severe censure the moment he submitted a N71 billion supplementary budget to the State House of Assembly with N5.6 billion for recurrent expenditure and N65.5 billion for capital expenditure.
In the letter the governor sent to the state assembly which was read by the deputy speaker, Okowa said, “there has been an actual and projected increase in some fiscal receipts. Consequently, the supplementary budget has become necessary for appropriation to pay for some critical projects and activities of the government as well as fund ongoing projects across the state in the year 2023. In the light of the foregoing, it would be greatly appreciated if the draft 2023 Supplementary Appropriation Bill is placed before the House at its earliest convenience for consideration and passing into law.”
Suspicions were raised when the State House of Assembly suspended some of its rules and passed the budget unanimously in a record 24 hours.
The All Progressives Party, APC, in a statement signed by its Publicity Secretary, Valentine Onojeghuo said, “The APC considers the request by the State Governor Dr Ifeanyi Okowa seeking parliamentary approval for a supplementary budget of N71 billion as the height of moral bankruptcy and wickedness by this administration against the people of Delta State. Not satisfied with securing a third term agenda through the installation of his surrogate, Sheriff Oborevwori, with questionable character as Governor of the State against the popular wish of the people, he has now brazenly decided to add salt to injury by seeking to obtain such humongous amount of money as a parting gift to the people of the State.”
The state chairman of the Labour Party, Anthony Ezeagwu described the bill as “Pure corruption.”
Telling Deltans to protest the bill, the former council chairman of Ethiope West Local Goverment Area of the State, Mr Wilson Omene said,”It smells nothing else but corruption at its height. It’s corruption at its peak. For somebody to be talking about N71 billion in less than two weeks to leave office, why doesn’t he leave it to the next incoming governor? This is what we have been saying that the Okowa government is a corrupt government and we have been vindicated.”
