Politics
Oghotoma To INEC, FG: Stop Funding Political Parties To Ease Corruption In Our Democratic System
By Daniel Dafe, Abraka
A member of the 3RD DELTA FORCE, 3DF and also a chieftain of the Social Democratic Party SDP, Sir Ohwo Benson Oghotoma (OBO), has called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Federal Government of Nigeria to stop sponsoring political parties in the country.
Sir Oghotoma said this while responding to questions from.journalists recently.
According to Sir OBO, there are many thieves hiding under non existing political parties to extort money from INEC and the Federal government to enmasse wealth to themselves.
Sir Ohwo Benson Oghotoma said most of the party executives add their names as candidates to enable their party logos to appear on the ballot in order to collect funds during election.
Adding that some party Chairmen deliberately refuse potential aspirants and candidates the opportunity so as to fix their names and their cohorts as candidates to collect the funds from INEC.
He continued: “Please allow political parties to fund themselves to reduce corruption from jobless politicians that will not work; it’s sad”!
“There’s freedom of association but not for the Federal Government and her agencies to foot their bills. They should go and work and do other businesses as politics is not work but a call to serve humanity.
“Am not saying that the number of political parties should be reduced but they must sponsor themselves,” he averred.
He urged President Muhammadu Buhari to wade into the issue of sponsoring political parties as part of his reform on the country’s electoral laws, saying that “there are many thieves who are not ready to workin order to keep collecting these funds.”
Oghotoma popularly referred to as The OTOMO 1, threatened to go to court if this plea is not looked into by INEC and the Federal Government.
This move he said would be for interpretation by the law court. stressing that we cannot continue like this “since the officials of most parties are thieves.”