By Oghenekevwe Laba, Lagos
Allegations making the rounds, mostly in the social media accusing Delta State Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) Governorship candidate in 2011 elections, Chief Great Ogboru of having defrauded Urhobo indigenes billions of Naira under the guise of using the money for campaign has been debunked by some of the alleged victims and well meaning Deltans who described the report as total false and an attempt to drag the good name of Ogboru into mud.
It would be recalled that a publication in the internet syndicated in twitters and facebook has repoted that Delta State Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM) chieftain, Victor Osharode, while addressing Orogun ward 2 unit Coordinators advised Urhobos not to cast their votes or rally support for Ogboru come 2015, threatening that Urhobo nation would disappear from the political map of Nigeria if they make the mistake of backing Ogboru in 2015.
In the report, it was alleged that Ogboru took huge sums of money running into billions of Naira from prominent Urhobo indigenes in the last elections under the pretext of using the funds to prepare the DPP to remove the PDP and Uduaghan from office, only for these funds to be diverted into his private business.
According to the report, Osharode alleged that Olorogun Otega Emerhor parted with N650,000,000, Solomon Awhinawhi N450,000,000, Ede Dafinone N50,000,000, Efe Oputu N10,000,000, Chief E. k. Clarke N30,000,000 and U. P. U. N10,000,000 among others.
To get the true situation of the allegation, Urhobotoday contacted Otega Emerhor if Ogboru collected such huge amount of money from him as political campaign fund and was not utilized as promised? He, however, denied the allegation through a text message describing it as “Not true”,
Dafinone who was alleged to have paid N50m to Ogboru described the report as false in a text message in respond to Urhobotoday’s query.
“This is a total false”, Dafinone said to Urhobotoday through SMS message.
During a telephone chat with Urhobotoday, Chief Solomom Awhinawi denied ever giving the sum of N450m for campaign purpose to Ogboru, wondering how that would have happened when he is a member of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
“How could I pay such a huge amount of money to Ogboru. Beside, I am not a member of DPP. I am PDP. It is not true that he collected money from me in any disguise. People are just being mischievous. Urhobo will not lear from their mistakes. It is sad,” Awhinawhi,” affirmed.
The evidence from these three prominent Urhobo indigenes alleged to have paid Ogboru money for campaign seems to have exonerated Ogboru from fraudulent activities. If that be the case, it means Osharode is flying false kite in order to tarnish the good image of Ogboru in particular and further create discord of disunity among the Urhobo in general.
Speaking to Urhobotoday through telephone Chief Great Ogboru described the person who gave the false information as having an ‘insane mind’.
Reacting to the propaganda, Mr Efe Duku, Personal Assistant to Chief Ogboru said there was no event at Orogun where Osharode was reported to have made such allegation, arguing that what happened is the handiwork of mischief who would want to put Ogboru in bad light before the public.
Accusing Mr. Victor Akpobrise for being behind such post in the internet, Duku said, “ The story about one Osharode accusing Ogboru of fraudulent act while addressing PDM followers at Orogun is false as investigation has revealed that one Victor Akpobobrise is responsible for the false posting in the internet. “There is no one Osharode in Orogun. We do not want to join issue with anyone. Whoever has a case against Ogboru should come out and prove it, Duku stressed, threatening that they would go to court to seek redress.