Governor AbdulRazaq accused Mohammed, a minister in the Muhammadu Buhari-led government of pocketing a huge amount of money donated to him (AbdulRazaq) by an undisclosed Igbo businessman towards his political campaign in 2019.
Despite the fact that the governor and the minister are members of the same political party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), the minister did not help him become governor of their state, Kwara, according to the governor.
“The Chief of Staff to the Governor of Kaduna State called and said Lai offered us an account, but it isn’t working, ‘can you give us another account so we can send you the money?’ But, since I was going to campaign, I said no problem. I remembered two days later and told them they needed to call him and give him an account number.”
” When we called, he stated Lai had taken care of everything, that one, as well as several others. He never told anyone that he accumulated money until today, as we speak.
“There’s a businessman from the South-East. His banker came to me and said his Oga (boss) wants (sic) to speak with me. I spoke with him and he said he was sending money to me. I said, thank you very much. After the election, he called me to congratulate me.
“When he saw I was just saying ‘thank you’, then he asked if Lai didn’t deliver the money, I asked him what money? He said N100 million,” the governor said.
According to the governor, Mohammed has failed to account for hundreds of millions of naira in campaign donations that he reportedly took.
In the run-up to the exercise, he claimed that the information minister humiliated him and acted against his interests.
The minister has previously denied stealing campaign cash, claiming instead that he paid for AbdulRazaq’s election with his own money.
The claims made by AbdulRazaq proved that the crisis in the Kwara APC was far from ended.
The party has been in disarray since Mohammed accused the governor’s team of misconduct during the revalidation process.
The minister afterwards made a statement warning that AbdulRazaq’s conduct could lead to the party’s chapter in Kwara collapsing.
The governor, on the other hand, said that the minister was merely expressing his displeasure and that he had no political foundation in Kwara.
In 2019, the two factions collaborated to defeat former Senate President Bukola Saraki and win control of the majority of state and federal elective posts in Kwara.
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