F-SARS arrests Governor Ajimobi’s former aide for withholding N18.5m meant for “Election Violence”

Former Special Assistant on Youth and Student Matters to Abiola Ajimobi, Governor of Oyo State, Odwin Obode has been arrested by operatives of F-SARS.

According to a report by SaharaReporters, Obode was picked up by men of the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad (F-SARS) some days ago following his refusal to return the N18.5million he allegedly received from the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Oyo State for the general election but did not spend.

Obode worked for Ajimobi during his first term as Governor but subsequently resigned with the explanation that he wanted to relocate abroad. He later went to work for Teslim Folarin, a two-term Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) senator who contested (and lost) the 2015 Oyo State governorship election on PDP’s platform before joining the APC in 2017.

However, towards the 2019 election when APC was fearing a bad performance, the party engaged Obode to ruin the election in Okeogun and Oyo town.

“Ajimobi gave him money to mobilise students as security cover for the election,” a senior party figure who asked not to be named, told SaharaReporters.

“They gave him N18.5million for the election, but they later found out that he didn’t do anything; he was just having fun, drinking, on election day. They were even calling him to get field reports on election day, but they couldn’t get him.

“The problem now is that despite the best efforts of the Governor to recoup the money, Obode doesn’t want to return it.”

When SARS officials searched his house last week, they found the bag with which the N18.5million was delivered to him. The bag still contained a leftover sum of N9million.

Obodo was then arrested but later released, though he still has to report at the F-SARS office regularly. SaharaReporters understands the “security cover” in the brief to Obode was actually “election violence”. According to a party source, it was “to disrupt voting at polling units where the process doesn’t favour the APC”.