A Federal High Court has directed the Delta State Governor, Sheriff Oborevwori to disclose details of former Governor Ifeanyi Okowa’s spending between 2015 and 2019.
The court order was sequel to a suit FHC/L/CS/803/2019 brought before it through a Freedom of Information (FoI) Act by the Social-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP).
The Federal High Court sitting in Lagos, ordered the governor to fully disclose spending details of over N200bn public funds collected by the administration of former governor Ifeanyi Okowa from the Universal Basic Education Commission fund and allocations from the federation accounts.
Delivering the judgment, Justice Daniel Osiagor of the federal high court, Lago, July, 17, ordered Oborevwori to “disclose details of budgetary allocations and actual spending by the Okowa government between 2015 and 2019″
In his judgment, Justice Osiagor held that “SERAP has cognizable legal right to inquire and know the way and manner public institutions manage public funds. I must say, that every citizen has a duty to demand transparency and accountability in the governance of public institutions.”
In lieu of that, Justice Osiagor ordered the Delta State government to “disclose how the Okowa government spent over N7.28 billion received from UBEC between 2015 and 2017, and N213 billion received from the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee in 2018, at an average of N17.8 billion monthly.”