Onitsha—Deputy Speaker, House of Representatives and Peoples Democratic Party, PDP governorship candidate in Imo State, Chief Emeka Ihedioha has restated that Governor Rochas Okorocha misappropriated N175 billion fund belonging to the local governments in the state and as such Imo people have rejected him for a second term in office.

Speaking to Imo indigenes in Onitsha, Anambra State, Ihedioha pointed out that investigation discovered that the outgoing governor of Imo State had collected from the Federation Account over N175 billion council funds from May 2011 to December 2014 which the APC administration could not account for.

He said there had not been any clear explanation from the state government as to how the funds were expended, adding that the governor had a case to answer over the misappropriated funds. “We have asked them what they used the money to do, they told us that they have used the money of the local government system collected between May 2011 and December 2014 to build 305 schools in Imo State, they told us that they used the money to build 27 hospitals in Imo State.We know that these projects have not been completed.

“We asked them how much did they use to build each of them. They also said that they used the proceeds from Ada Palm about N4billion as concessioned to Roche to build the 305 primary schools and the same 27 hospitals. They also told us that they used part of the N18.5 billion bond they collected from Ikedi Ohakim’s administration to also build the same primary schools and hospitals.”

According to the governorship hopeful, “to utilise funds belonging for local governments to other purposes other than the development of the council areas is a breach of the constitution and breach of the will of the people and that offence is punishable. The way to punish that offence is to vote that government of Rochas out.”