Alleged $12m Fraud: Uzodinma Risks Arrest over Failure to Appear before Panel

-

Image result for Hope Uzodinma,



Embattled Senator representing Imo West senatorial district and candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2019 governorship election in Imo State, Hope Uzodinma, risked being arrested by the Presidential Investigation Panel for Recovery of Public Property.

This is due to his failure to appear before the panel investigating him over allegations of $12million contract scam.

The panel had last Sunday arrested him on arrival at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport over his failure to present himself for interrogation in the $12million contract for the dredging of the Calabar channel.

The panel later admitted Uzodinma to administrative bail and asked him to return the following day for interrogation.

However, the Senator pleaded with the panel to allow him to come on Tuesday so as to attend to his health.

Again Uzodinma failed to appear before the panel last Tuesday after rescheduling the time from 3p.m. to 8p.m. Operatives of the panel assigned to investigate him waited till 9.30p.m. before calling it a day.

However, it was learnt that Uzodinma, who later called in to explain why he could not make it on Tuesday evening, promised to present himself again on Wednesday by 11a.m.

But as at the time of filing this report, the senator was yet to make himself available.

As at Tuesday night, the panel had concluded plans to lay siege at his Maitama residence in Abuja, with the aim of arresting him to their office to answer to the fraud allegations.

Reacting to the development, Chairman of the panel, Chief Okoi Obono-Obla, confirmed that Uzodinma was yet to report, and that he had overstretched the panel.

"We have been looking for this man since December 2017. We have sent numerous letters to him. We even went to his house in February and pasted our assets declaration form, because that is the first stage of our investigation.

"By law, he has 30 days to fill and return, he did not do that. We charged him to court. He has overstretched us," he said.

According to the chairman, the move to investigate the senator has nothing to do with him contesting election, adding: "We have to do our job. Nobody is above the law.

"Why is he running away over an allegation that he collected over N5 billion to do a project in Calabar," he asked, adding that "tomorrow, they will turn round to say Buhari is responsible for the backwardness of South-south and South-east region.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Court Stops National Assembly From Taking Over Bauchi Assembly

-
Image
As the National Assembly received a report from the committee it sent to Bauchi State to probe the leadership crisis rocking the state assembly since its inauguration last month, the state high court on Monday issued an order of interim injunction ordering that the present Speaker and Deputy Speaker, Abubakar Suleiman and Danlami Kawule respectively,   should continue leading the assembly pending the determination of the suit before it. Justice Muazu Abubakar, who issued the order, fixed October 3, 2019, for hearing of the motion and substantive application filed by the speaker, deputy speaker and other 11 members of the assembly who participated in the assembly election. Abubakar said after listening to and considering the submissions made by the lawyers of the applicants Barrister Jibrin Sa'id Jibrin, A.S Idris and U.K Adam, he hereby ordered that status qou between the parties in the suit be maintained until the determination of the motion on notice. I
Read more

Population of Doctors in Nigeria Hits 74,543

-
Image
  The number of registered medical doctors in Nigeria has risen to 74,543. According to the federal government statistics, as at 2018, the stock of professionally regulated health workers in Nigeria health sector has also recorded a significant increase. The population equates to 36.3 percent of medical doctors per 100,000 population (doctor to population ratio of 1: 2753). Fifty-nine percent of the registered medical practitioners were in good standing with 35 percent being females. While presenting the statistics at a one-day workshop on Nigeria Health Workforce for Universal Health Coverage organised by the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Abuja, Deputy Director, Human Resource Department, Shakuri Kadiri, said there is a variation in the distribution of medical doctors by state of practice from the reported 2012 density. He said: "The density of medical doctors presented is based on the number of doctors in good stan
Read more

UBEC Board Chairman, Daughter Freed from Captivity

-
Image
The Board Chairman of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Dr. Muhammed Mahmoud, and his daughter were on Tuesday released by their abductors. Mahmoud, his daughter and several other travellers were abducted last Monday on the Kaduna-Abuja expressway when suspected bandits open fire at them. The UBEC boss’ driver was said to have been killed during the incident. There has been no information about other commuters who were abducted by the bandits. Mahmood's freedom was confirmed in a telephone interview by Hussaini Danladi, a relation, who said they were freed from captivity at about noon yesterday. Danladi, however, did not say whether a ransom was paid before their release. The kidnappers seemed to have taken over the Kaduna-Abuja expressway which has been deserted by travellers following the deadly activities of the criminals-kidnapping, armed robbery among others Despite the massive deployment of security of personnel on t
Read more