A former governor of Rivers State and present Transport Minister, Rotimi Amaechi, on Tuesday disclosed that he once rejected the sum of N1 billion in bribe while serving as the Rivers state Governor.
Amaechi while speaking in Lagos at a forum convened to discuss the place of social media in Nigeria’s political and socio-economic development, said he rejected the bribe because of his principled stance on corruption.
The Transport Minister’s claim comes on the heels of his statement during an interview with Channels TV wherein he said he does not like money.
Speaking at the forum, Amaechi said: “My first confrontation with bribe was with a big contractor in Rivers State. After awarding the contract, he brought a billion naira. I screamed.
“I asked, ‘where did you get the money?’ and he said from what he got (from the contract) and I said ‘look, that means you overquoted the contract’.
“I said ‘the only reason you are giving me N1 billion was because if the contract was N32 billion, you made it N37 billion’.
“I have been special assistant to the governor for two years; speaker, eight years; governor, eight years; minister nearly two years…that’s nearly twenty years.
“So I know Nigerian politics well. Very, very well.”
In reaction to the claim, Nigerians on social media took to their page to express their varying opinion with regards to the claims made by the Transport Minister.
Read some of the comments below:
