The Vice Chairman (South-south) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dan Orbih, has said that no member of the National Working Committee (NWC) who returned money paid into their account will be probed.
Naija News recalls that Orbih and five others returned N122.4 million meant to be a housing allowance benefit to the party coffers after a report claimed it was a bribe.
This development has generated a lot of reactions with the party setting up an investigative committee to look into the allegations that the housing allowance paid to the NWC accounts was a bribe.
However, in a chat with The Punch on Tuesday, Orbih said the NWC members who returned the money paid into their account have not committed any offence.
Orbih added that the affected members will reject the move to subject them to an investigation, stressing that he was never in any meeting when that approval for housing allowance was given.
He said, “I was never in any meeting when that approval (housing allowance) was given. We also established that they should say the date the meeting took place when that approval was given. It was also observed by all those who returned the money that their decision to return the money was based on the story reported in The Nation Newspapers that the money was a bribe.
“It may well be that even the administrative staff may be responsible for the leakage because one of them went to Arise TV to justify the payment. We want to know the source because having been informed by the NWC members that this is not the first time such would be leaked because there was even some money paid to some NWC members under Muazu, the vouchers were even published.”
On the allegation that the money wasn’t a bribe, he said, “Well, it’s not an allegation, we stated in our letter that this money is being returned based on the stories in the newspaper that the money paid was a bribe.
“But most of us who were present and who had alerts on our phones showed that there was no narrative accompanying the payment. So, there’s no way they would have known from heaven that the money was for allowance.”
This article was originally published on Naija News
