EFCC Trails Ladoja’s lawmakers over alleged N1.5b theft

The 32 lawmakers that served in the troubled administration of former governor of Oyo State, Senator Rashidi Ladoja, are to keep a date with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commis­sion (EFCC) any time soon as the anti-graft agency extends its probe of the alleged illegal diver­sion of the N1.5 billion proceeds from the sale of the state govern­ment’s shares in some blue-chip companies to members of the state House of Assembly.

Already, the speaker of the legis­lative assembly then, Hon. Adeolu Adeleke, had been asked to report to the EFCC office in Ikoyi, Lagos along with his other 31 colleagues.

This followed the visit of a team of EFCC operatives to Ibadan, the state capital last week to garner fresh evi­dence and track some government officials that allegedly benefitted or participated in the sharing of the loot.

The visit by the investigators from the Economy Governance Unit of the commission was prompted by new revelations by one of the suspects held for the scam which first blew open in 2008.

But, Adeleke is crying blue mur­der, alleging that the renewed inter­est in the case was politically moti­vated. He pointed accusing fingers at Governor Abiola Ajimobi as being behind the scheming in an alleged bid to embarrass him and scuttle the governorship election petition filed against him by Ladoja. The former Speaker is the Director General of the campaign organisation of Ladoja in the 2015 polls.

A suspect, one Wale Atanda, a former aide of Ladoja, who was al­legedly in charge of and disbursed much of the allegedly stolen funds, had in his confession, reportedly claimed that the 14 Peoples Demo­cratic Party (PDP) Assembly mem­bers loyal to the governor during his impeachment ordeal were paid N1 million each for nine months after reinstatement, in addition to N20 million they each got as constitu­ency project allowances which were reportedly never executed.

Besides, they were said to have been bought brand new NISSAN cars by the governor.

The largess was seen as compen­sation to the pro-Ladoja lawmakers in appreciation of their support for him, as it was not extended to the governor’s opponents in the House.

Apart from this, Atanda, now on bail and being considered as key prosecution witness when the case goes on trial, according to sources, alleged that part of the stolen money (N78 million) also went into pay­ing for one of government houses (Quarters 361) in Agodi GRA, alleg­edly bought by a company, Bristrum Investment Ltd, in which Ladoja re­portedly had interest.

The former Chairman of the State Housing Corporation, who later served Ladoja as Executive Assistant in the twilight of the regime, sources said, also alleged that he paid some of the former governor’s family members including his wives mil­lions of naira on the instruction of his boss.