Responding to Wike’s allegations for the first time on Friday, Ayu said the N1 billion was a proposed bank loan that the party wanted to take from a friendly commercial bank.
By Emma Ogbuehi
The National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, said on Friday that the governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, lied against him when he alleged that he (Ayu) collected N1 billion gratification from an unnamed PDP presidential aspirant.
Ayu spoke at the Abuja national secretariat of the PDP shortly after he attended a meeting of the party’s Board of Trustees (BoT).
This is the first time the embattled national chairman would comment on the allegation.
Wike had recently accused Ayu of taking the said N1 billion from an unnamed aspirant shortly before the PDP presidential primaries.
On Friday, he upped the ante when he further accused the PDP chairman of collecting N100 million twice for the renovation of a new office for Peoples Democratic Institute (PDI), a research outfit of the PDP.
According to Wike, Ayu collected the first N100 million from an unnamed PDP Governor and still collected another N100 million from the PDP National Working Committee (NWC) for the same purpose.
READ ALSO: BREAKING: Ayu collected N100m twice from different sources for doing same work — Wike
Insisting that Ayu was a corrupt man, Wike said, “If people know what we know, if we release what we have, Ayu’s children will go to him and say we are no longer your children.”
Ayu has maintained a studied silence in the face of Wike’s grave allegations.
The Rivers governor said the PDP helmsman cannot talk because he is guilty.
“There cannot be any comment. He [Ayu] cannot say anything. Look, I am the Governor of Rivers state and I don’t just come out to speak.
“Let Ayu say he did not collect N1 billion. In fact, let me also tell you, Ayu collected [another] N100 million from a Governor that he was going to renovate our democratic institution and then he [Ayu] went back to the PDP NWC and took the same N100 million for doing the same work.
“What kind of system is that? I am telling you all these are facts. Let him [Ayu] say no first, and I will tell you [those he collected money from],” Wike said
But responding to Wike’s allegations for the first time on Friday, Ayu said the N1 billion was a proposed bank loan that the party wanted to take from a friendly commercial bank.
He however said the party dropped the idea after due consultations.
On the N100 million, Ayu admitted that a PDP Governor actually made the donation to the party for the purpose of renovating the NDI office accommodation.
According to him, the donation was used for the purpose for which it was given and the party did not even exhaust the entire fund on the renovation exercise.
Ayu, however, denied collecting another N100 million from the NWC for the same purpose, saying that Wike’s claim was not true.
