Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose, has reacted to the alleged denial of the involvement of Zenith Bank Plc in the funding of his election in 2014, saying the bank should come out with an official statement on the matter.
The governor was reacting to a news report in the media claiming that the bank had dissociated itself from the funding of his election. The Trent’s messages to the communications department of Zenith Bank asking for comment have gone unreplied.
Speaking through his chief press secretary, Mr. Idowu Adelusi, in Ado Ekiti on Thursday, June 23, 2015 the governor said, “I stand with my claim that Zenith Bank Plc majorly funded my election in June 2014.“
“I don’t expect an organisation like Zenith Bank to stay in a corner in matter of national concern like this and be talking.
“Rather, I expect the Zenith Bank to issue an official statement not as feeble as this one being peddled in the media so that I can begin the second stage of my revelations.
“My statement was made in the open and if I can accuse an institution like Zenith Bank in the open, I expect the institution to give official reply and not one online medium claiming sources in the bank.
“All what have been claimed to have been said by the Zenith Bank in the media can be situated in the realm of rumour because an organisation like Zenith Bank won’t react to issues through sources.
“And I want to refer the APC, the Zenith Bank and the EFCC to John chapter 8 verses 6-7, which says, ‘This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not. When they continued asking him, he lifted up himself and said unto them, he that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.
“Let those who are orchestrating this know that failure awaits them.”
Zenith Bank Top Management Meet Fayose
According to sources in Ekiti Government House, a top management team of Zenith Bank Plc on Thursday paid a reconciliatory visit to the embattled Ekiti governor, Mr. Fayose over the matter of the election funding of the governor’s 2014 election campaign.
“They came to beg,” a media aide of the governor, Mr. Lere Olayinka told The Trent.
The visit of the team follows unverified reports that unnamed officials of the bank had denied the governor’s claims that the bank majorly funded his election campaign.
The team was led by an executive director, Sola Oladipo who was accompanied by two zonal directors of the bank and the Ado-Ekiti branch manager of the bank, the source said.
Journalists on the scene accosted the Zenith Bank officials as they left the government house. The executive director declined comment saying that only the bank’s official spokesperson could speak to the press.
“They were begging me and that the matter should not go beyond this level. I asked them why did they go to the EFCC to tell lies?” Fayose reportedly said following the meeting. “Why did they have to lie that money came from the Office of the National Security Adviser? Why did they have to link with me what is not?”
