Edo State government said far more vehicles than numbered has been taken away by officials of the former governor Godwin Obaseki.
The chief press secretary to governor Monday Okpebholo who took the reins of power this month said that a probe panel has been set up to trace the whereabout of the vehicles.
“So far, the committee set up to recover vehicles, as of this morning from findings that I made, they had recovered about 10 vehicles,” said the CPS Fred Itua said on Monday’s edition of Channels Television’s Lunchtime Politics.
“From the conversation I had with the chairman of that committee, he said that the initial figure of 200 was understated that there are almost 500 vehicles that are still missing and as of yesterday, they had traced about 21 of those vehicles to the house of a very top appointee of the last government,” he said.
Itua added that some of the missing vehicles were also traced to a former official of the past government of Godwin Obaseki.
“Then, another – about 15 – traced to the house of another [top appointee of Obaseki’s government], and in the coming days, they intend to legitimately recover these vehicles and other assets belonging to the state that are being held in private hands, which ordinarily should not have happened.”
However former governor Obaseki’s media aide, Crusoe Osagie in a separate interview stated: “We know what their plans are with the diversionary probes.
“It is just a smokescreen to mask the governor-elect’s incompetence and unpreparedness for office, having come into power through a stolen mandate.
“We want to advise Okpebholo to focus on governance and improving the lives of Edo people rather than waste state resources masking his incompetence in meaningless probes.”