Presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi has said allegations of financial misappropriation levelled against the National Chairman of the Party, Barr. Julius Abure must be investigated to clear the air.
Obi said this on Thursday at a press briefing in Abuja where he maintained that financial accountability must be adhered to within the party.
Flanked by the Head, of Publicity Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Organisation, Yusuf Tanko and Firm supporter of the party, Aisha Yesufu Obi said an independent probe of the finances of the party would put to rest all the accusations and counter-accusations.
“For the party (LP), I am a member of the party and they have chosen to say that I am the leader.
“What we need to do in the party and I have discussed it with the leadership, We must now appoint a reputable audit firm to audit and be able to deal with the account of the party.
“Where I am involved in anywhere money is been spent, it must be transparent. So the allegations and counter allegations now must be thoroughly investigated and verified and we would reconcile it and know what exactly we do,” Obi stated.
The Leader of the party also said that “because there are some people, like support groups, there are some people even abroad who collected monies that they are going to use it in the north and everywhere.
“We were not stringent that everything you collect must come to us, but we want whatever is collected to be accounted for. This is why we are appealing to the public to let us know,” Obi said.
Buttressing the call for accountability, Chairman of the fundraising Team of the Campaign Organisation, Mrs Aisha Yesufu, outplayed the expenditure incurred by the campaign team.
According to her, Peter Obi’s presidential campaign team spent over N744,500,000.00 on litigation in courts over the 2023 presidential election.
She pointed out that the fundraising team received donations totalling N595,976,994.00 from Nigerians.
From the donations from citizens, we received N595,976,994. This is the money we raised from the four accounts that we have talked about. We also received N800,000,000 from the candidate himself (Peter Obi).
“We designed a strategic blueprint focused on channelling the movement energy and support for Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed with different support groups. We provided direct and indirect support to over a hundred support groups across all 36 states in Nigeria.
“We also deployed media-related campaigns that reached over 11 million people, leveraging over 40 radio stations, community outreach, and social media.
“We would have loved to use Televisions and all of that, but because of our financial constraints, we were mindful of being judicious in our usage of the funds that we received.
“So, out of these things, campaign materials worth N258,374,330.00 were procured and distributed across the 36 States and also in Abuja. Media and radio broadcasting was at the cost of N16,432,867.00.
“For the election promotion expenses, we had N10,808,948.00. For Polling Unit Agents, we spent N324,381,700.00. And then, of course, we had bank charges of N1,750,544.00. We also had administrative charges of N477,000.00.
“We deployed N744,500,000.00 to cover legal expenses. And then, in campaign and election activities, we had over N28,500,000.00. On the issue of legal fees, remember what I said earlier: We had N800,000,000.00 that the candidate himself brought,” Yesufu said.
According to her: “Accountability and transparency are very critical and important; that is why we asked people to donate so that we could come back to them to explain how their money was judiciously used. We thank everyone who donated in cash and kindness, she stated.