Leadership (Abuja)
23 August 2008
Shocking revelations emerged yesterday after the just concluded screening exercise conducted by the Bayelsa State House of Assembly for 19 commissioner– nominees in the state, on the award of contracts, illegal procurement of loans from banks and misuse of empowerment loan scheme by officials under the aborted 10– month administration of Governor Timipre Sylva.
The most indicting revelations came from former commissioners under the administration of the vice president and the present governor. The commissioners, whose re-nomination was also submitted as part of the screening exercise, were the immediate past commissioner for Commerce and Industry, Mr. Bekes Etiafa, the immediate past commissioner for Energy, Chief Dikivie Ikhiowa, the past Finance commissioner, Dr. Sylva Chalse-Opuala.
Others with submissions that indicted the activities of the government include the immediate past commissioner for Health, Dr. Azibabu Eruani and that of Environment, Elder Bethel Amabebe.
The revelations have provoked the calls by different groups and political parties in the state, including the publish-what-you-pay campaign group, that the former commissioners of Commerce and Industry, Bekes Etiafa and his colleague in the Environment Ministry under the administration of Chief Timipre Sylva should be arrested and prosecuted over their alleged admission of complicity in the procurement of a N150million loan and the disbursement of a N540million loan initiatives to their relatives without due process and government approval.
At the second and third day of the screening exercise in the House of Assembly, submissions from the commissioner and governorship flagbearer of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), Elder Bethel Amabebe revealed that the controversial loan secured from the First Inland Bank under the name of the State Environmental Sanitation Authority was without the state governor's approval and withdrawn two days after the May annulment of Governor Sylva's election by the Appeal Court.
Amabebe, whose probe by a section of the legislators created a division among the 24 members of the state House of Assembly, admitted that "the loan was without the approval of the state governor. But since the admission of the loan procurement without due process and deposited in a private account, the state government has not reacted on whether he would be withdrawn or not.
The former state commissioner for Finance and Budget, Dr. Sylva Opuala-Chalse, while explaining the involvement of his office in the procurement of the loan, confirmed that the state governor gave approval for the loan but that at the time the loan was finally secured, "the state government is not liable for the repayment of the N150million loan."
In another revelation, the former commissioner for Commerce and Industry and a commissioner nominee to the yet-to-be reconstituted cabinet of Governor Timipre Sylva, Mr. Bekes Etiafa, told the dumbfounded members of the state House of Assembly of a N540m state government loan scheme.
Etiafa confessed before the state House of Assembly members, that, out of the total sum of N540million meant for disbursement to co-operative societies in the three senatorial districts of the state, the sum of N340million had been disbursed before he left office. He also informed the House that his father, mother and other family members benefited from the first category of N15m each but without belonging to a registered co-operative society.
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