…says Mbata’s Senatorial Ambition, height of moral decadence
The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Imo State is alarmed at the desperate attempts by the APC Senatorial Candidate for Imo East, Mr. Alex Mbata, to distort records and bend history in order to hide his questionable past. In a recent media outing, Mr. Mbata was quoted to have dismissed credible media reports which had requested him to account for his role in the monumental fraud at the Imo State University, Owerri as mere “media hogwash”.
Curiously, while trying to exonerate himself from the scam, the only defense Mr. Mbata could come up with was that he has always been a rich man, and that he has also been a man of charity who has constructed a 5-kilometer road for his village people. This is not just watery and puerile, it also begs the question about the source of Mr. Mbata’s slush funds.
Most importantly, history is replete with instances of notorious fraudsters and criminals who had sought to shield their infamy with apparent deeds of charity.
Lawrence Anini, the infamous bandit who terrorized Benin City, was known to be spraying money in the streets after each successful bank robbery. American fraudster, Al Capone, even went as far as building free soup kitchens where he fed over five thousand people during the Great Depression in America. German tyrant, Adolf Hitler, even while killing over six million Jews, made a law prohibiting the killing of animals. So, doing charity is not a defense for weighty allegations of fraud.
Imo PDP therefore feels deeply pained that the efforts made by the Rebuild Imo Administration of the Party in the State to sanitize IMSU and upscale the institution’s infrastructure and pedagogy have been rolled back by the immoral regime of Senator Hope Uzodinma. Worse still, those who should be brought to book over their filthy roles in the collapse of that citadel of learning have now been decorated with APC tickets by Uzodinma, and they are now fouling up the media spaces to hoodwink the masses. As far as Imo PDP is concerned, what Uzodinma intends to achieve through the morbid and sinful senatorial ticket, which he singlehandedly handed over to Mr. Mbata, is to institutionalize corruption in Imo State, while reducing the Nigerian Senate to a sanctuary of fraudsters.
It is pertinent to remind Imo people that, in keeping with the vision of the PDP to build an educational robust Imo State, one of the earliest observations which our Rebuild Imo Administration made upon assumption of office was the pedagogical and infrastructural inadequacies of Imo State University, Owerri. In view of that, the PDP Government set up a Visitation Panel to expose the issues that had hampered that institution. Mr. Mbata was Pro Chancellor and Chairman of Governing Council of IMSU and was appointed by the APC regime in 2014. The Visitation Panel, which was headed by Venerable (Prof.) Chinedu Nebo, investigated the issues between 2012 and 2019.
The Panel’s Whitepaper, in paragraph 5.1 entitled ‘Abandoned Building Contracts’, indicted Chief Alex Mbata who reasons best known to then as Chairman of Council, replaced 3-D Consultant with Mayfair Projects Ltd, contrary to laid down procedures by TETFUND.
Imo PDP therefore demands immediate arrest and prosecution of Mr. Mbata so as to ascertain his role in the non-execution of the projects funded under his watch as Pro Chancellor and which consultant he was indicted to have unduly replaced.
For Imo PDP, this matter touches on the very moral fibre of our society, and it is an issue which imperils the future of Imo children who today at IMSU are subjected to the most miserable conditions because of the dearth of basic health and educational infrastructure.
Signed:
Collins Opurozor
Publicity Secretary
Imo State PDP.