EFCC Boss To Atiku: I Had No Meeting With Gov Obovrewori, Okowa Before Defection

The Economic Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC says it Chairman did not have a pre-defection meeting with Governor Sheriff Obovrewori of Delta state, and his predecessor Ifeanyi Okowa.

The anit-graft agency denied the claim on Friday, few days after Paul Ibe a spokesman to the 2023 PDP presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar claimed that  the meeting held in the state Government House.

The magazine reporst that Governor Obovrewori and Okowa dumped the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, for the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC in April this year causing mixed reactions from not a few Nigerians.

Before the defection, Okowa was  being investigated by the EFCC for an alleged over N1 trillion fraud. Not a few therefore considered his defection to the APC as having a political undertone and for self-preservation to escape the agency’s onslaught.The former governor said his defection was not based on either.

Reacting in a statement issued by the Commission’s spokesman, Dele Oyewale the EFCC said there was no meeting between the two politicians and its chairman.

According to Oyewale, the EFCC boss is apolitical and that the commission’s operations are purely professional without any political undertone.

The statement reads, “The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, is outraged by the unfounded claims of Mr. Paul Ibe, spokesperson to Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, former Vice President, alleging that Ola Olukoyede, Executive Chairman, held a secret meeting with an unnamed politician.

“Ibe, who was a guest on Seun Okinbaloye’s Politics Today on Channels Television on Thursday, May 22, 2025, bared his mind on sundry theories, conjectures and assumptions relating to opposition politics and defections.

“However, his allegations of the Executive Chairman EFCC, Mr. Ola Olukoyede and Solicitor General of the Federation’s alleged meeting with an unnamed governor forty -eight hours before his defection to the ruling All People’s Congress, APC, are patently fabricated and in bad taste.

“Olukoyede has stressed at several fora that he is apolitical and the EFCC totally wired against partisan tendencies.”