Immediate past Chairman of the Cross River State Internal Revenue Service, Peter Oti, has finally bared his mind on his recent arrest by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, in an electronic mail to www.calitown.com.
Oti begins his mail thus; “Let me use this occasion of my birthday to thank my family members, my former students,colleagues,supporters, friends and well-wishers for putting up a strong defense of my character when the ugly incident of my abduction by some overzealous officials of the EFCC took place recently”.
He goes on to say, “That I could operate illegal accounts, own houses in Abuja, Lagos, Port Harcourt etc, is in the imagination of the petitioner who may be thinking that having given the Cross River State the highest IGR during my one-year stint as Chairman of IRS, I may have reserved so much for myself. I am yet to be confronted with the “Bank Accounts” and the location of the houses in “choice locations” across the country as alleged.
My accusers are detractors who succeeded in entertaining some of their readers in an attempt to pull me down. My integrity cannot be defined by political opponents, but by my conduct in all the places I put in meritorious service spanning a period of about 28 years. Truth, they say is constant. To me, truth is constant, fade-less and without an expiry date.Falsehood on the other hand has an opposite fate. In spite of all the amount of resources applied to engage in this blackmail I feel satisfied when I hear most people say they know the truth, the sequence of events and the motive of the masterminds. If this is how honesty, hard-work and diligence should be rewarded,then our politics has a long way to go,especially in a state whose the annual budget is financed by inflows of more than 40 per cent from loans and grants. Recall that I moved road infrastructure maintenance levy from N900 million in 2013 to N1.9 billion in 2014, out-station revenue from N197.6 million in 2013 to N551.7 million in 2014,just like the MDAs revenue jumped from N3.4 billion in 2013 to N5.7 billion in 2014; there were other quantum leaps.
I must congratulate Babatunde Fowler whose hard work in Lagos has moved him to a higher pedestal. In my state, my effort has earned me blackmail and degradation. I don’t know what legacy we think we would bequeath to the upcoming generation when falsehood is seen as a tool to settle political scores and smear those we have no ethnic hate”.
He concludes his reaction by asking his friends to, “please refer to Psalm 23 and read meditatively as we pray to God to give us the good hearts to enable us see the way to progress in all ramifications”.
Oti was recently arreted on the strength of a petition written to the anti-graft agency.
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God should forgive the petitioners. Dr. Oti should not be disturb as the have made you more popular.
My candeed advice to my brother is to remain calm, cos he is a honest man. We shall soon see thier end. Good Leaders all over the world are always persecuted.