Controversy trails Modu Sheriff’s visit to Benue

CONTROVERSY is trailing last week’s visit by the factional national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, to Benue State.

While the secretary of the faction in the state, Mr Emmanuel Akaa Lim, has been sacked, he is alleging that the leadership received a sum of N5 million donation, from the state government to support the visit.

The allegation has divided the factional state working committee of the PDP, less than four days after Sheriff paid the familiarisation visit as part of arrangements to prepare the ground for the 2019 general election.

But the chief press secretary to the governor, Mr Tarhav Akerzua, denied the release of N5 million to the factional leadership to host Sheriff.

He said: “If Makarfi comes to Benue, the state government will receive him. All former governors deserve such treatment, but Governor Ortom did not give anyone N5m for the visit of Sheriff.”

When asked whether the action of the governor to receive  Sheriff was to spite his predecessor, Dr Gabriel Suswam, who belonged to the Makarfi-led PDP faction, Akerzua said that the governor had no hand in the arrangements for the visit of Sheriff, stressing that the “notion of planning for 2019 or to spite Suswam is out of it.”

While in the state, the former Borno State governor, who visited the Government House in Makurdi, was later taken round major contact points with an official despatch rider attached to his convoy.

The factional state secretary, Lim who was sacked a day after the visit, alleged that the financial donation was part of the controversy trailing the visit of Sheriff.

Lim vowed to convey his grievances to the national secretariat of the party.