The governorship candidate of All Progressives Congress (APC) in Imo State, Sen Hope Uzodimma, has alleged that there are plans by some politicians from the South East to smear his image.
Pointedly, Uzodimma disclosed that those vicious politicians, in a plot with Chief Okoli Obono Obla, chairman of the Presidential Investigation Panel on Recovery of Public Funds, are alarmed and jittery over the prospects of a ministerial appointment for the APC candidate.
A statement at the weekend by the director of Media and Special Duties of his campaign organisation, Declan Mbadiwe Emelumba, said in their desperation to paint the Senator bad, the politicians have conspired with Chief Obla to resurrect the phoney allegations of non-assets declaration and non-execution of a $10m NPA contract.
According to the statement, these vicious men, with the active connivance of Chief Obla, have gone to a federal high court in Abuja to resurrect a case filed since July last year, which died a natural death when a federal high court in Port Harcourt restrained the presidential panel from any further harassment of the Senator.
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While recalling that at every critical juncture in the battle for the APC Imo governorship ticket, Uzodimma disclosed that Obla, using the Presidential Panel, had come up with several, sometimes-contradictory allegations against the Senator, apparently aimed at stopping him from getting the ticket.
According to him,”Obla’s allegations ranged from non declaration of assets to diversion of $10m for NPA dredging contract and later travel ban. Senator Uzodimma debunked each allegation effortlessly including sending copies of his assets declaration forms to the Presidential Panel.
“The so-called NPA contract payment was for a project in which NPA was a majority shareholder, while Uzodimma’s company only had a minority stake and reiterated that the matter was already in court of competent jurisdiction, which cast doubts on Obla’s real motives for investigating a matter in court.”
He stated further that, “It is instructive that once it was clear that Uzodimma had irrevocably secured the APC governorship ticket, nothing was heard again from Obla about these allegations until now.”
