The LEAH Group has said its Founder and a former First Lady of Kwara State, Evangelist Omolewa Ahmed, is not on the run over an alleged invitation by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
The LEAH Group in a statement by its Executive Director, Lanre Bello, faulted a report that Ahmed was part of the beneficiaries of a N2 billion Kwara State Small and Medium Scale Enterprises Directorate fund allegedly given gratis.
Rather, Bello said the non governmental organisation officially applied for a N16 million loan from the SMED to expand its operations and had so far repaid N3 million.
He also said the Founder of the Charity that operates in the health sector, with a larger part of its focus on breast cancer, was never invited by the EFCC contrary to the report.
The statement said: “Our attention has been drawn to a publication in The Nation Newspaper of 13th August 2019 in respect of the 2Billion naira Kwara State Small and Medium Scale Enterprises Directorate (SMED) fund where it was insinuated that our founder received part of the money. The insinuation suggested in the write up is absolutely untrue and a brazen attempt to malign our founder.
While neither our organization nor our founder was directly mentioned, the publication contained innuendo fully suggesting that our Founder was being targeted as reference was made to our mission statement.
“Our position is that in our quest to continue to serve the good people of Kwara State in pursuit of our mission to provide intervention in the Health sector, particularly the fight against breast and cervical cancers that is daily killing women, we approached the Kwara State SMED for a 16 million naira loan to develop a medical facility. The application was duly processed and approved. So far, the organization has repaid 3 million naira and is currently working on paying the balance.
“At no time was any money paid into the accounts of our founder by the SMED neither has she received any cash from the scheme. Therefore, the insinuation that Her Excellency (Evng) Omolewa Ahmed has been evading EFCC invitation or is on the run is totally false. No invitation has been extended to her.
“For the records, we state emphatically that the insinuation that our founder directly received the money is not true.”
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