Gov. Ayade Threatens To Sue Cross River AAC Chairman After Exposing Corruption

The Cross River state Chairman of the African Action Congress AAC, Agba Jalingo, may soon be docked if the state governor, Senator Ben Ayade goes ahead with his threat.

The AAC State Chairman had alleged in an opinion article that about N4billion Naira was withdrawn from the State and Local government joint accounts, just before the last elections, to fund what the governor called 'quick win projects' in the 18 LGAs and that the memo never made it to exco to give details of the projects.

But the governor in his reaction to the article accused Agba of peddling wrong information and threatened to sue him.

In an angry message  in response to the article, the governor said: "You are going to be confronted with the facts, then face prosecution for misinformation."

In his reaction, Mr. Agba Jalingo, who is also the publisher of CrossRiverWatch, said the governor is gradually beginning to behave like an emperor while accusing the governor of lacking the slightest of skin to handle disgreement and scrutiny.

"There has never been a time in my life when I was a coward or afraid of any human being takless of going to court. I am a customer in the dock. Due to the near absence of opposition in our state, a lot is going wrong and people have generally been cowed. Our governor is beginning to behave like an unquestionable imperial emperor. Gradually, I am taking up my role as a leader of one of the opposition parties in the state and our party wants to make it clear that the only thing that will satisfy us as a party is answers to our questions, not threats of going to court. The court is not a firing squad.

"As a party, we are carefully gathering our information about the withdrawal and we will break it down for Cross Riverians very soon. The government should prepare answers not threats. Threats wont work. They are dealing with a new kind of opposition that threats do not work with. As we enter his second term, the tempo of these questions will increase and answers alone will avail."

Recently, allegations of financial impropriety have made headlines from the state and more and more stakeholders are coming together with a view to to paying closer attention to how the state resources are expended.