Delta State Government, Tuesday, refuted newspaper reports (not in Vanguard) that a serving commissioner in the state has been arrested on allegation of cocaine possession.

A statement by the state Commissioner for Information, Mr. Chike Ogeah, said the report was absolutely false.

He said: “We state unequivocally that no commissioner in Delta State was arrested over alleged involvement in trafficking of hard drugs. Every commissioner and member of the Delta State Executive Council is accounted for.

“Although investiga-tions are still ongoing, we have established the fact that in some instances, official documents of the Delta State Government certifying that the holder is an official of the state government may have been fraudulently issued. It has equally been established that the persons who issued such documents were not indigenes of Delta State.

“However, Delta State Government is collaborating with the relevant security agencies in ongoing investi-gations. In effect, all staff of the Abuja Liaison Office have been directed to cooperate with investi-gators in order to deter-mine the source of and persons associated with unauthorised issuance of official state documents.”

The statement said that reports relating to drug trafficking required a rigorous and foolproof investigation before being taken to the public do-main, stressing that the newspaper failed to undertake this simple task.