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EFCC arrests Ogbeh, whereabouts unknown
BOLADE OMONIJO, Deputy Political Editor

*ACD accuses FG of witch-hunting
*Govt denies political motive

FORMER Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Audu Ogbeh, was, Friday night, arrested and detained in Abuja by officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
Although efforts to speak with the chairman of the anti-graft commission, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, and Ogbeh failed, reliable sources indicated that he was arrested in connection with alleged mismanagement of PDP funds under his leadership.

A statement by Alhaji Lai Mohammed, chairman of the Advanced Congress of Democrats, ACD’s Committee on Media and Publicity, to which Ogbeh has been linked, accused the Federal Government of witch-hunting leaders of the party to pave the way for the alleged third term bid of President Olusegun Obasanjo.

However, the Federal Government, in a swift reaction through the special assistant to the president on public affairs, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, dismissed the claim that the arrest was motivated by politics. His words: “If Audu Ogbeh has been arrested, you have to ask yourself who arrested him and why. If it’s EFCC, it has nothing to do with politics. I can assure you that this president does not prosecute people for their views; rather we are prosecuting a relentless war against corruption. And, in that war, anybody that’s truly corrupt will not be spared.”

Mohammed, who queried why Ogbeh was picked up more than a year after he resigned his chairmanship of the PDP, challenged the government to charge him to court if they had anything against him.
The new party’s spokesman accused the Federal Government of intolerance and expressed fears for the sustenance of democracy if government could be so intolerant. He pointed out that two other leaders of ACD, Princess Funke Adedoyin and Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, had been similarly invited by the EFCC, with Dalhatu now detained at Ikoyi Prisons in Lagos.

Mohammed’s words: “Information has just reached us that Chief Audu Ogbeh, the former chairman of the PDP and one of the founding fathers of the ACD, was arrested by the EFCC yesterday and his whereabouts remain unknown.
“It will be recalled that only a few days ago, our party alerted the nation to the plan of the PDP-led government to arrest leading members of our party. With the arrest of Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, a former minister of power and steel, still in custody of the EFCC, the thinking of the PDP-led government is that the leaders of the ACD have to be kept in custody so as not to derail the two-day public hearings on the proposed constitution amendment.”
The ACD spokesman said the party would not be deterred by what it called the wave of arrests, “neither will it change the verdict of millions of Nigerians on this issue.”

Calling on the Federal Government to effect the release of Ogbeh and Dalhatu with immediate effect, the party berated the government for being intolerant of divergent views. The party challenged the Obasanjo government to charge them to court if it really had anything against them.

But, another member of the ACD, Mallam Garba Shehu, expressed surprise at the development. He called on Nigerians to check the “anti-democratic actions” of the government.
Ogbeh was forced to resign as chairman of the PDP January, last year following a disagreement with President Olusegun Obasanjo over the handling of the Anambra crisis. As national chairman of the PDP, Ogbeh wrote the President a letter, which was leaked to the press, taking a critical view of the activities and management of the economy.

In a blistering attack on his party chairman, Obasanjo replied that Ogbeh was part of the problem with Anambra State. The President hinted that the fortunes of Ogbeh who reportedly left the Shehu Shagari government in the Second Republic penniless had suddenly changed within a short period of presiding over affairs of the PDP.

The anti-graft commission recently stepped up its activities at curbing the corrupt practices of politicians. The EFCC is currently prosecuting the former governor of Bayelsa state, Chief Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, and is on the heels of at least three other governors. They are the governor of Plateau state, Chief Joshua Dariye, and his counterparts in Taraba and Benue States, Jolly Nyame and George Akume respectively.

Other states visited and whose finances are being investigated by the EFCC include Adamawa, Enugu, Sokoto, Bauchi and Edo. Opposition leaders have accused the President of using the EFCC as a weapon to scare and cow only those opposed to him and his policies, leaving out his loyalists.

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