A former acting Governor of Taraba State, Sani Danladi Abubakar, a former Minister of Labour and Productivity, Senator Joel Ikenya Danlami and a former Speaker of the Taraba State House of Assembly, Hon. Mark Bako Useni, are being probed by the EFCC over their alleged sharing of about N1.150billion.
This N1.150billion is out of the N23.29billion poll bribery funds allocated to their states as each of the three states received N450million from Fidelity Bank totaling N1.150billion.
A top source in the EFCC said: “The former acting Governor of Taraba State, Senator Sani Danladi Abubakar (Taraba North) was the chair of the sharing committee of the N450million campaign slush fund for the re-election of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan.
“Other members are Senator Ikenya and Hon. Useni.”
“When interrogated, the former office holders claimed they distributed the money to the 16 local government areas of the state. They gave N140million(at N28m each) to five local government areas and N264million ( at N24m each) to the remaining local government areas,” said the source,
“Useni admitted he collected Takum Local Government’s N24m.
“They confessed to have personally benefited individually from the fund. The former minister admitted to have taken N4million. He presented a GTB draft of N2million and promised another draft for the same amount today. His co-suspect deposited a draft for N1million and the balance to be paid later.
“The EFCC has intensified its investigation of all gravy funds with the aim of recovering as much from the beneficiaries,” the source added.