Publish Dasuki’s statement, my accounts, Fayose challenges EFCC

Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State has challenged the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to make public the statement it has extracted from a former National Security Adviser (NSA), Colonel Sambo Dasuki (retd), in its ongoing probe of money allegedly meant for the purchase of arms and the funding of the last general election in the country.

Governor Fayose, in a statement on Sunday, also challenged the EFCC to publish his personal accounts it had frozen “to let the whole world know what are contained therein.”

A government statement said the governor threw the challenge at the weekend, while featuring on an interview programme on a radio station, Fresh FM.

The statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr Idowu Adelusi, said the governor contended that “by publishing Dasuki’s statement, it would, at least, show whether the ex-NSA gave money to former Minister of State for Defence, Senator Musiliu Obanikoro or anybody to give him (Fayose).

“The EFCC is only engaged in mind game. They think they can wear me out, that is not possible as God is on my side because I stand for the truth. EFCC has not told Nigerians how money was wired to me. They must be responsible to do investigation that would not be a media issue. What the EFCC and their APC collaborators are trying to do is to set the people of the state against me and they have failed.”

“We cannot all be in the APC, if we are then, we are no longer practising democracy. There must be opposition and that is to keep those in government on their toes, but if you now make silencing the opposition as your main programme, then, you are short changing the people. The people are hungry, they are ravaged by poverty and what you think is the best step to take is to kill the voice of the opposition. If the situation was this bad, the PDP would have been removed from office long time ago,” he added.

On the June 21, 2014 governorship election that brought him to office, Fayose said Dr Kayode Fayemi and APC leaders conceded defeat and that both local and international observers described the poll as free and fair.

“After the APC leaders failed to stop my inauguration, get me impeached, they know that they will still lose again in 2018. What they are trying to do is to create a wedge between me and the people of the state who love me. As far as I am concerned, their project is dead on arrival. The voice of the people is the voice of God,” he stated.

The governor urged Nigerians to always carefully dissect every information churned out by the party in power, saying the APC was leading the country as if it was still seeking the votes of the people.

This, the governor noted, “is why the government is more involved in propaganda than really informing the people about what is actually happening.”