3 years after leaving office, EFCC questions ex-Gov Orji over alleged N27bn fraud

A serving senator and former governor of Abia State, Theodore Orji, was on Wednesday summoned and interrogated by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over alleged N27 billion fraud.

The interrogation is coming after over three years since the former governor, who ruled Abia from 2007 to 2015, left office.

It was learnt that the anti-graft agency summoned the governor for questioning following series of petitions written against him shortly after he left office in 2015.

The commission was said to have commenced investigation into those allegation earlier but had to pause due to lack of enough evidence.

Apparently having found more evidences, the EFCC then invited the former governor to come and explain how he allegedly mismanaged about N27 billion.

The senator, who represents Abia-Central senatorial district, was said to have visited the EFCC office in Abuja in the company of his lawyer.

Some of the allegations levelled against the former governor was that he diverted billions of naira disbursed to Abia State by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for Small and Medium Enterprise.

The lawmaker was also alleged to have diverted money from the Ecological Fund account, which should have been used in tackling erosion and other disasters peculiar to the state; that he diverted money from the Abia State Oil Producing Development Area Commission, an agency of government set up for the development of the oil producing areas in Abia State.

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The former governor was said to have supposedly used the funds to purchased properties in Abia, Port Harcourt and Abuja, some of which the EFCC is planning to seize.

It was also learnt that officials from the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation, the Central Bank of Nigeria, commercial banks and other agencies had been invited by the EFCC to make statements on the governor’s case.

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