Ortom and the 23 cars

The news that former Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State was given 23 cars on leaving office should be an issue of concern to every Nigerian who wants the development of the country.

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Except, perhaps, for the subject who benefited from that unimaginable wastefulness, nothing in the world justifies the allocation of 23 cars to a governor on leaving office.

Ortom had accused Governor Hyacinth Alia of using state power to witch-hunt political opponents, alleging that one of the things the administration had done was seize 23 vehicles legitimately allocated to him after he left office.

He spoke on Arise News , where he said he challenged the seizure in court and defeated the state government, which was subsequently ordered to return the vehicles and pay him N5 million in damages. However, the vehicles are yet to be returned to him.

He said: “As I talk to you, after I left office, vehicles that were given to me legitimately by government, this government went and seized them in a manner that was not befitting.

“No communication to me was done. I went to court and we defeated government. And they were asked to pay me five million in addition to returning the 23 vehicles they took away from me, which were legitimately given to me by government.”

When this issue is analysed, especially within the context of a state that experienced insecurity at an unprecedented level during his administration, the reported 11 months of unpaid wages and the fact that he wants to have the cars back, one is bound to hold one’s head in disbelief.

In fact, Chief Press Secretary to Governor Hyacinth Alia of Benue State, Tersoo Kula, put it more bluntly when he questioned such a level of lavishness and asked how many governors left their states with such a large number of cars.

Reacting on the Morning Show, an Arise TV programme, Kula said: “Sometimes we want to point a finger at somebody, and then four fingers are pointed at you. The question here is: what did Ortom need the 23 cars for? He is not the first governor of Benue State. He is not the first governor in Nigeria. How many governors who came to develop the state left with that number of cars? In any case, these cars were not taken to his house as something that is genuinely given to you. They were hidden in a mechanic workshop somewhere that they claim did not even belong to the former governor himself.

“The owner of that workshop had to take the Benue State government to court because of this. It is difficult to understand. It opened a vista to understand really what Ortom entrenched in Benue State as the governor for eight years. This state was practically run aground. That is why I listened to him when he said that the governor is concentrating in Makurdi, the state capital. This is tantamount to the fact.

“The mechanic workshop was the person who took government, first of all, to court because in the first instance, these cars were hidden in a workshop. It was on intel that the security agencies got wind that some cars were hidden somewhere in the workshop, that they had to invade the workshop, and they discovered these cars. Why go and hide them?”

For his part, Arise TV anchor, Oseni Rufai, who also spoke on the programme, said: “I think this conversation regarding the 23 cars issue is really interesting. I never believed that public officials should be able to take things that belong to the state.”