Arms Probe: Falae Won't Return N100m Received From Anenih

Chief Olu Falae, the national chairman of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), has said he won’t refund the N100 million he collected from Chief Tony Anenih, which allegedly came from the former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki.

Speaking on Monday, January 11 at a press conference, in Abuja, through the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Dr. Abdul Ahmed Isaiq, Falae insisted that his party would not return any money to the government coffers, Vanguard reports.

Explaining why the money would not be returned, he said the money was given to him for onward delivery to his party, to assist sell former president, Goodluck Jonathan’s second term bid.

He said it was not paid through the office of the former NSA and but through Tony Anenih, the former Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Falae said: “We can’t refund any money to anybody because the money we got as a party came because of the alliance we had with the PDP and we have the agreement note from this alliance.

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“If it is possible that the money Chief Anenih gave us was from the arms deal, it is left for them to ask Chief Anenih to clarify. As far as we knew, we did not have any dealing with Dasuki."

The SDP cahirman asked the government to hold Anenih, the source of the money rather than himself or his party.

According to him, he cannot be a part of those returning money to the government as the people doing so were those who got money directly from the arms deal fund.

He said: “Our fund did not come from the arms deal, our fund came from an electoral alliance with the PDP and we knew that the PDP had a fund raising committee that gathered billions of naira and PDP had been in government for 16 years.

“So, with that, we knew that the PDP had the capacity to fund the alliance that was formed with them by the SDP.

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“We, as a political party knew that the PDP was a capable hand in the electoral alliance which we entered with them. And we equally knew that the PDP had a fund raising, where it generated over N20 billion down.

“So, whether the money came from Col. Sambo Dasuki or his office, is what we don’t know and it is left for them to ask Chief Tony Anenih to explain.”

A number of prominent politicians have been fingered in the $2.1billion arms deal scam. Anenih had written to the EFCC explaining how he disbursed the N260 million paid into his bank account from the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA). He said N100 million was given to Falae. The money was part of at least $2.1 billion allegedly diverted by Dasuki, from arms purchase to politicians.

Source: Legit.ng