‘Peter Obi’s Alleged $12.24m Investments Are Worth Virtually Nothing’, Says Soludo

Charles Soludo, the governor of Anambra State, claimed on Thursday that the alleged $12.24 million investments made by Peter Obi, his predecessor, were worthless.

According to Soludo, one of his predecessors in office, Peter Obi, allegedly invested N1,955,535,247.00 (equivalent to about $12,616,356.43 at the time’s average CBN exchange rate of N155.00/$1), but it was worth virtually nothing.

According to www.bigpenngr.com, Obi, the Labour Party’s presidential candidate, presided over Anambra from 2006 to 2014 before receiving the party’s nomination. 

As governor of Anambra State, he is alleged to have invested millions of dollars in International Breweries on behalf of the state. Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev), the largest brewer in the world and a multinational conglomerate with its headquarters in Leuven, Belgium, owns International Breweries (IB) Plc.

In a Channels Television interview with Politics Today, Soludo claimed he was not aware of any investments any of his predecessors had made in the state.

“I think there was something I read about somebody speculating about whatever investment. With what I’ve seen today, the value of those investments is worth next to nothing. So, let’s leave that aside,” the governor said.

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The governor also discussed the plans his administration has for the residents of Anambra State, mentioning that more than 5,000 teachers in the region will soon receive employment letters.

He stated, “We are handing out employment letters to more than 5, 000 teachers to end an era of schools without teachers.

“We are going to have 240 plus doctors and consultants to man our general hospitals, so if you look at the five fingers approach of our programmes we designed our budget to keep our eyes on the ball.”

The governor made his comments after he gave the House of Assembly chambers in Awka the N258.97 billion 2023 budget.

The budget, which was dubbed “the budget of acceleration,” increased from the N170 billion revised 2022 budget Soludo presented in May.

The 2023 budget, he claimed during the presentation, represents the “single-minded focus and determination to continue pressing the accelerator pedals in spite of the risky bumps along the way” of his administration.

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The budget has N164 billion in capital expenditures, which makes up 63.2 percent of the total, and N95.5 billion in recurrent expenditures, which makes up 36.8 percent of the total and results in a N13 billion budget deficit.

According to the governor, land transportation, power production, and urban reintegration accounted for about N91.8 billion, or 56% of the total capital expenditure.