Chief Olabode George, a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain has denied reports that he collected N100 million from from former minister of State for Finance, Bashir Yuguda.
George, a former deputy chairman of the PDP and title holder of Atona Oodua of Yorubaland, described the claim as “another blatant falsehood, stripped of any iota of truth”.
He said that this was a continuation of the lynch mob journalism orchestrated by an online newspaper. Sahara Reporters had reported a supposed confession of Yuguda who is in the custody of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over an alleged $2.1 billion fraud. In the report, Yuguda was said to have named top PDP chieftains as having received funds from the office of the National Security Adviser.
The PDP leader, in a statement said: “My attention has been drawn to another mischievous and deliberately fraudulent claim that I collected N100 million from Bashir Yuguda, the former Minister of State for Finance. This is another blatant falsehood, stripped of any iota of truth. This is yet again a depraved continuation of lynch mob journalism orchestrated by an online newspaper.”
In an effort to set the records straight, he said: “The salient fact is that very early this year, long before the election period, the party set up Contact and Mobilization Committee for each zone to reconcile various factions and ensure a firm unity of purpose within the zones before the election. I was elected as the Chairman for the South-West zone.
“The committee which was made up of 18 senior members of the party with distinguished history of honour and exemplary leadership, met at least 10 times in my office in Lagos. These people travelled all the way from every corner of the South-West, with three members representing each state. All of them are very much alive to testify to my assertions. Sometime in the middle of these deliberations, Yuguda came to me and said the party was reimbursing the 18 elders of the committee for their transportation, accommodation and feeding allowance for the work that was done.
“The committee later submitted the report of its deliberations to the party and then wound up. For all these efforts Yuguda gave the committee only $30,000. That was less than N6 million at that time. Yuguda can never claim that he gave the Committee N100 million. That is the figment of the imagination of rascally scribblers purporting to be journalists. Again, facts are sacred.”
