The presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 elections in Nigeria, Peter Obi, has called for a thorough investigation into the alleged financial impropriety levelled against the National Chairman of the party, Comrade Julius Abure.
Obi made the call on Thursday in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja at a media briefing he called on the issue.
The briefing also afforded him the opportunity to render the account of his campaign.
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The former two-term Anambra State Governor said: “For the party, 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, is that we must now appoint a reputable audit firm to audit and be able to deal with the account of the party.
“When I am involved, anywhere money is, it must be transparent.
“So the allegations and counter allegations now must be thoroughly investigated and verified and we would reconcile it and know exactly what we’ll do.”
The Chairperson of the FundRaising Team of the Obi-Datti Campaign Organisation, Aisha Yesufu, who rendered an account of funds raised and spent during the campaign, said: “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 kind.
“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 million from the candidate himself (Obi).
“We designed a strategic blueprint focused on channeling 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 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.”
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