Police quiz Oyo commissioner over alleged financial impropriety - Allegations are lies, says Commissioner

By Adeolu Adeyemo - 16.01.2008

Oyo State Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Mr. Hosea Agboola, is reportedly being quizzed by the officials of the Special Fraud Unit (SFU) of the Nigerian Police, Ikoyi, Lagos, for alleged financial misappropriation, illegal deduction and diversion of local government funds.

Nigerian Tribune investigations revealed that the commissioner was invited last Wednesday by the SFU officials to their office in Lagos and interrogated him on alleged illegal deductions and diversion of funds from the statutory allocation meant for the 33 local government areas of the state.

It was gathered that the commissioner was quizzed for hours by the SFU officials before being released on bail. He was asked to be reporting to the SFU station in Lagos on daily basis.

The Commissioner of Police in charge of the unit, Mr.Yinka Balogun, told newsmen on the telephone that it was true that the commissioner was invited.

“I can confirm to you that he was being investigated. We got petitions against him on fraudulent financial practices. We invited him to come as we are investigating a case relating to his office. He is coming back to my office tomorrow,” Balogun added.

A top police officer who preffered anonymity, however, revealed that “the police swung into action with their investigations after they received a petition letter from some aggrieved former council chairmen who wanted to recontest, but were screened out of the exercise at the eleventh hour.

“The petitioners said they did that because Agboola allegedly played a significant role in their nullification.” When later contacted on phone, the commissioner confirmed that he was in Lagos but desribed the allegation as a lie. He explained that there was no way he could divert the local government funds, saying that the allocation of local government funds could not be single handedly spent as alleged by the petitioners.

‘My ministry and all the local government chairmen usually take joint decision before funds could be deducted from the federal government allocation meant for them.” Agboola then charged members of the public to dis- regard the allegation he described as baseless and unfounded, adding that” those who wrote the petition against me were cowards and faceless people who could not confront me”.

Also speaking on the development,The Chairman of the Ibadan North-West Local Government, who was also the chairman of the state chapter of the Association of Local Government of Nigeria, Mr. Yemi Yusuf, desribed the allegation as ruse.