The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general election, Mr Peter Obi, has called for the probe of the party’s national chairman, Barr. Julius Abure, over the alleged misappropriation of N3 billion out of the N3.5 billion raised for the 2023 election campaign.
Obi said there must be investigation of the alleged financial impropriety against Abure.
Recall that on Monday, the National Treasurer of the LP, Mrs Oluchi Oprah, accused the party chairman Abure of misappropriating N3billion out of the N3.5 billion raised for the campaign.
Oluchi was later suspended on Wednesday for not appearing before a disciplinary committee.
But, Oluchi told LEADERSHIP that her suspension was premeditated since the invitation came Tuesday night to appear on Wednesday by 10am and she was suspended by 12pm the same day after she missed her flight to come to Abuja.
However, the pesidential candidate of the LP, Peter Obi, said Thursday in Abuja at a media briefing that the accounts of the 2023 Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Organisation must be investigated.
“For the party (LP), I am a member of the party and they have chosen to say that I am the leader. What we need to do in the party and I have discussed it with the leadership is that we must now appoint a reputable audit firm to audit and be able to deal with the account of the party.
“When I am involved anywhere, money must be transparent. So the allegations and counter allegations now must be thoroughly investigated and verified and we would reconcile it and know exactly what we do,” Obi said.
Also speaking, one of the LP presidential campaign council members, Aisha Yesufu, who was the chairman of the Fundraising Team of the Campaign Organisation, said that they spent over N744,500,000.00 for litigations in courts over the 2023 presidential election.
She also said that their team received donations totalling N595,976,994.00 from Nigerians.
“Accountability and transparency are very critical and important; that is why we asked people to donate so that we could come back to them to explain how their money was judiciously used. We thank everyone who donated in cash and kindness. From the donations from citizens, we received N595,976,994. This is the money we raised from the four accounts that we have talked about. We also received N8,000,000 from the candidate himself (Peter Obi).
“We designed a strategic blueprint focused on channeling the movement energy and support for Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed with different support groups. We provided direct and indirect support to over a hundred support groups across all 36 states in Nigeria. We also deployed media-related campaigns that reached over 11 million people, leveraging over 40 radio stations, community outreach, and social media.
“We would have loved to use Televisions and all of that, but because of our financial constraints, we were mindful of being judicious in our usage of the funds that we received. So, out of these things, campaign materials worth N258,374,330.00 were procured and distributed across the 36 States and also in Abuja. Media and radio broadcasting was at the cost of N16,432,867.00.
“For the election promotion expenses, we had N10,808,948.00. For Polling Unit Agents, we spent N324,381,700.00. And then, of course, we had bank charges of N1,750,544.00. We also had administrative charges of N477,000.00.
“We deployed N744,500,000.00 to cover legal expenses. And then, in campaign and election activities, we had over N28,500,000.00. On the issue of legal fees, remember what I said earlier: We had N800,000,000.00 that the candidate himself brought,” Mrs Yesufu stated.
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