By James Orji
Barely hours after former Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo state declared for president the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has filed N2.9 billion fraud charges against him.
The former governor was arrested in 2019 by the anti-graft agency for alleged financial fraud and grilled him for 48 hours before he was eventually released.
Okorocha who has now joined the 2023 presidential race has been in a tug of war with his successor Governor Hope Uzodinma for allegedly cornering properties belonging to the state. Some of the properties have now been seized from the former governor, who once claimed that the state owed him N8 billion security votes.
“As Governor, I sacrificed my security votes. Imo State Government still owes me. If I’m to go by my 250 million…, I have 8 billion now in Imo State. I was Rochas before becoming a Governor.
“The projects I’ve done in Imo State, nobody can say he beats my record in the history of the state. I challenge anyone with a contrary view, I’ll resign from politics if you do. The people who speak against me, in the next 20 years, cannot do what I have done.
“Since I left Imo State Government, no single project has been built by my successors, except maintaining what I already built. Even the…chamber that was commissioned by Buhari, I built it,” the former governor said last September.
The EFCC charge sheet indicates that Okorocha was charged alongside Anyim Nyerere Chinenye, Naphtali International Limited, Perfect Finish Multi Projects Limited, Consolid Projects Consulting Limited, Pramif International Limited, and Legend World Concepts Limited.
In the 17 counts filed on Monday at the Federal High Court, Abuja, EFCC alleged that the defendants conspired to steal N2.9 billion public funds.
Two years ago EFCC grilled the senator after tracing some properties to him, including residential estates, schools, and shopping malls.
Among the sealed property and investments traced to Okorocha in July 2019 were Rochas Foundation College, Owerri, East High Primary and Secondary school, Owerri which belonged to Okorocha’s first daughter, Uloma Nwosu, and All-In Supermarket, Owerri, Imo State.
In the run-up to the last general elections, the EFCC had placed Okorocha under investigation for allegedly withdrawing over N1bn from the state government coffers to aid the campaign activities of his son-in-law, Uche Nwosu, during the governorship polls in Imo state.
Meanwhile, the former governor who currently represents Imo West in the Senate has reacted to claims of police brutality in the country. Okorocha who spoke on Monday during his presidential declaration in Abuja, the nation’s capital said there is nothing like police brutality in Nigeria.
In October 2020 many Nigerian youths staged protests across the country under the aegis of ENDSARS demanding an end to police brutality and reform in the NigeriAn Police Force, NPF. The protest later became bloody after soldiers shot and killed some protesters at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos.
But the former governor said what is obtainable in Nigeria is youths brutalizing youths. “There is nothing like police brutality. There are only youths brutalising youths,”
