INEC chair: I didn’t receive N2bn gratification – Lawan

Senate President Ahmad Lawan has dismissed report by SaharaReporters, an online news platform, alleging that a group he leads collected N2billion from Professor Mahmood Yakubu to facilitate the confirmation of his appointment for a fresh five-year tenure as chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

Yakubu was first appointed as INEC chair on October 21, 2015 by President Muhammadu Buhari. He was reappointed after his first tenure lapsed in October this year.

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SaharaReporters had, in a report published on Wednesday, quoted a top source as saying that prof Yakubu paid “a princely sum of N2bn to a group” led by Lawan and another N1bn to another group to facilitate his reappointment.

The Senate President described the report as a “cheap blackmail” and urged Nigerians to ignore the report as “yet another incident of hallucination”.

Lawan, in a statement by his media aide Ola Awoniyi, challenged the medium to provide evidence to support its claims.

“It is noteworthy that the publication, as always with its ridiculous fabricated reports, could not even expand the entertainment of its readers by providing the names of members of the fictitious group and where the group operates from. To be sure, that group exists only in the mischievous imagination of the writer of the fiction,” he said.

“The Senate President is only a presiding officer of the Senate and does not lead any group in or outside the august chamber that acts in any way to circumvent the processes of the Senate.

“We reassure Nigerians that the Senate President did not receive any gratification, in his or behalf of others, to help Professor Yakubu get a second term as chairman of INEC,” he added.