Dasukigate: We still owe Falae N78m, says SDP

Friday Olokor, Abuja

The Social Democratic Party has defended its chairman, Chief Olu Falae, over the N100m which he allegedly collected from the Peoples Democratic Party during the 2015 general elections.

The SDP said the money was meant to assist in the re-election of former President Goodluck Jonathan.

The party, which denied that Falae singlehandedly collected the money from the former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dusuki (retd), said it was still indebted to him (Falae) to a tune of N78m.

The SDP recalled that in 2007, Falae, as National Chairman of Democratic Peoples Alliance, supported Gen. Muhammadu Buhari and his party and adopted him as the party’s presidential candidate since the DPA had no presidential candidate.

The SDP said, “It is on record that the DPA made financial contributions of about N20m to Buhari’s campaign in the South-West which was championed and led by Chief Olu Falae. If that did not constitute a crime or offence to warrant investigations then, inter-party electoral cooperation in 2015 can neither be novel nor constitute a crime.”

The National Publicity Secretary of SDP, Alhaji Alfa Mohammed, spoke during a press briefing in Abuja.

He said, “It was not Chief Olu Falae but the SDP which had a working agreement with the PDP during the last general elections. Such an agreement is normal in a democracy.”

Mohammed, who said the SDP stood by Falae over the N100m traced to the Office of the NSA, denied that Falae pocketed N40m out of the N100m given to the SDP by a former chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees, Chief Tony Anenih.

He said, “How can we be disappointed when it was the party that mandated him to go ahead? How can the party be disappointed? The PDP wrote us a letter, he brought it to the party and we deliberated on it. We wrote back to them, gave them conditions and they responded. So how can the SPD be disappointed in him?

“It is lie that he pocketed N40m. What happened was that the EFCC checked his account statement and observed that only N60m went directly into various party accounts in the states.”

While raising the alarm of alleged plot by some members of the All Progressives Congress in Ondo State to arrest Falae ahead of the forthcoming governorship election, Mohammed told journalists that such plan was illegal.

He therefore called on President Muhammadu Buhari to caution his party’s members against carrying out the plan.