I’m ready for probe, Okonjo-Iweala declares

Former Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on Sunday declared support for President Muhammadu Buhari’s anti-corruption drive, saying she was ready to subject herself to an unfettered government probe of her two terms in office.

The former Minister, who was reacting to media reports that she was planning to build a multi-million dollar Okonjo –Iweala family hospital in Abuja, denied nursing any such ambition.

Mrs. Okonjo-Iweala, who spoke through her spokesperson, Paul Nwabuikwu, described the report as “totally baseless”, as “the alleged hospital is non-existent”.

“Dr Okonjo-Iweala has a clean record of two terms in office,” the spokesperson said. “As we have consistently maintained, she is not afraid of a transparent investigation of her two terms in office. She supports the anti-corruption drive in Nigeria. No one who has had the privilege of serving his or her country should feel too big to be investigated.

“It is this very issue of fighting corruption that brought her back in the first place and she has a track record of blocking corruption. It is ironic that it is those same corrupt people who are trying to tarnish her image,” he said.

Mr. Nwabuikwu denied the existence of any hospital owned by Mrs. Okonjo-Iweala’s immediate family.

“Anyone who is in doubt can go to Gwarinpa, Abuja where the hospital is allegedly located, or enquire from General Electric and Perkins + Will Global, the two organisations that were mentioned as Consultants to the project in the report as to whether the hospital has been built,” Mr. Nwabuikwu said.

-Premium Times