N700M Campaign Fund: Edo PDP Gets Succor As Court Adjourns Case To Oct. 15

BY JOHNSON ALABI, BENIN – The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Edo State chapter on Tuesday as a Federal High Court sitting in Benin City, the State capital adjourned till October 15, 2020 on a case of fraud instituted the party and some of its officials by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The EFCC charged Mr Tony Aziegbemi, Dan Orbih and others to court over alleged handling of campaign funds of about 700 million naira in 2015.

While announcing the adjournment, the Court said it is owing to the fact that the prosecution is not ready as reports indicate.

Mr Aziegbemi and the former chairman of the Edo State chapter of the PDP, Mr Orbih, are being charged by the anti-graft agency to account for the party’s management of the campaign funds and its source.

This s as the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the September 19 Edo election, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, being a former member of the PDP was also named in the matter before the court.

However, public accounts have shown that the role of Ize-Iyamu in the N700 million saga was mainly hinged on his supervisory role as the Edo State Director General of the Campaign in 2015 but had no direct dealing with the handling and spending of the funds.

But, the Edo PDP and its leaders have insisted that they are innocent of the allegation, saying that apart from privately sourced funds from independent donors that were spent on campaign activities as agreed on by the leadership of the party across all its organs in State, no other funds got to them.