N60m SURE-P fund: Ondo PS, EFCC in mild drama

Temitope Adedeji

Akure

A mild drama ensued at the office complex of Ondo state Local Government Pensions Board, Akure over the weekend as one of the newly sworn in Permanent Secretaries, Mr Olipede Ezekiel Dare and operatives of the Special Frauds Unit of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) engaged in serious scuffles when the perm sec resisted arrest.
Olipede was a director before he was elevated to the position of PS and sworn in along with other newly promoted Permanent Secretaries in December last year.
He was said to have been a guest of the commission and Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences (ICPC) over allegation of N60 million SURE-P funds allegedly misappropriated by the council officials at Owo local government where he was the council director before his new promotion as permanent secretary.
It was learnt that Olipede’s latest arrest by the operatives of anti graft agency may not be unconnected with series of fraud related cases dangling on his neck when he was at Owo local government council of the state as a director.
Trouble started when the Permanent Secretary resisted arrest and threatened the operatives that he would call Governor Rotimi Akeredolu to call top police hierarchy who would in turn order their arrest from his office.
The PS was also quoted to have threatened to mobilise mob action against the operatives if they refused to leave his office despite the warrant of arrest shown to him by the senior officer that led the team of the operatives.
The PS utterances and his scanty respect for the anti graft agency however, provoked the operatives who vowed to effect his arrest and whisk him away to the agency’s office in Lagos.
The CSO who pleaded with the operatives later stood for the embattled PS and promised to produce him on Friday morning while the two parties agreed to meet at the police headquarters, Agbatoro Akure the following morning
The development took a new dimension on Friday morning when the latter reported at the police headquarters on the order of the operatives and after a brief interrogation, the unsuspecting Permanent Secretary was whisked away by the operatives to the agency’s office in Lagos

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