By Onyekachi Eze
Turbulent challenges facing the immediate past governor of Imo State, Rochas Okorocha may not cease even after he left office on Wednesday having completed his tenure.
However, barely 24 hours Ihedioha took over the administration of Imo, unconfirmed news has it that the former governor, his wife and two brothers were arrested by operatives of EFCC over alleged financial misconduct, and sealed his apartment in the Eastern Palm University, Ogboko. The information went viral in the social media and some notable media outfits also carried it as breaking news.
Against this backdrop, the EFCC Spokesperson, Tony Orilade while responding to daily post online handle described the news as fake.
They said, “such report that Okorocha and wife have been arrested is fake news. Disregard it”.
Meanwhile, the governorship candidate of the All Progressive Congress, APC, for Imo State in the just concluded 2019 general elections, Senator Hope Uzodinma has declared that the immediate past governor of Imo, Rochas Okorocha must go to prison.
Uzodinma made this assertion after the swearing in of the new governor, Emeka Ihedioha.
It would be recalled that Senator Uzodinma and Okorocha have been involved in verbal war of late.
In a press release obtained by Trumpeta Newspaper, signed by Uzodinma’s campaign Director on Media, Declan Emelumba, he said that Okorocha deserves to be in prison by now, having contravened massively during his 8 year tenure as a governor.
The Senator representing Imo West (Orlu zone) in the National Assembly also accused Okorocha of being a serial electoral fraudster who ought to be in jail for many offenses.
He added, “If there is anybody that is actually shameless in Imo State, that person is Okorocha. For a man who was governor in Imo for eight years and had to rely on violence to be declared winner of a senatorial election, shows that he is finished politically.”
In a related development, Okorocha’s kinsmen from Ideato have beckoned on the anti graft agencies to hasten up with the arrest of their brother, Okorocha.
Expressing their feelings yesterday in Owerri, the Ideato Restoration Movement through their leader reminded the Commission that the immunity clause protecting the ex governor had expired immediately a new governor emerged.
According to the leader of the Movement, Collins Opurozor, they wondered why EFCC has not moved into action to arrest Okorocha despite over thirty-two petitions which the anti-graft agency had already received.
Part of the communiqué reads, “This extraordinary session was convened in order to celebrate the end of Okorocha’s impunity, ruination and cruelty in Ideato. But most importantly, it became expedient for us to meet and review the progress we have made regarding the petitions we have sent to the EFCC for the prosecution of our brother and former governor of the state, Chief Anayo Okorocha. We have written the Commission thirty-two times from various angles on about fifteen subjects before this day. We are quite worried that nothing has been done”.
He continued, “For instance, the farcical, infantile and masturbatory governorship aspiration of Okorocha’s son-in-law gulped over twenty billion Naira. Nigerians need to know the source of that money. There is also the issue of the missing bailout funds. Another is the over one hundred and thirty billion Naira debt which Okorocha obtained but was never accounted for. And lots more”.
“We have absolute confidence in the leadership of Ibrahim Magu and we enjoin the EFCC to do the needful, because justice delayed is justice denied”.
