Saraki under fire for impersonation

Controversies have continued to trail former Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki over the use of the official email account of the Office of the Senate President to send out personal emails despite leaving office.

While his aides have expressed regrets and apologized for the blunder, National Dailygathered from sources close to the new Senate President, Ahmed Lawan, that they are already receiving some heat from Aso Rock, Nigeria’s seat of power over the blunder.

“Pls note that the message below is from Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki who was the President of the 8th Senate. Even though the statement is valid and authentic, it was wrongly sent through the wrong email address. All inconveniences are regretted. Thanks,” the aide wrote.

This, National Dailygathered drew the ire of aides of Lawan who were immediately alerted by friends in the media as well as Villa Contacts. They reached out to Saraki’s media handlers who immediately clarified that they mistakenly used the email account.

“On leaving office the email account was supposed to have been handed over to aides of the new Senate President but that didn’t happen, hence this embarrassing incident,” a National Assembly source disclosed.

Recall that in an apparent bid to counter series of media attacks targeted at Saraki, his aides issued a strongly worded press statement debunking EFCC claims that the former President of the Senate was using the media against it, using the official email account of the office of the Senate President.

According to his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Yusuph Olaniyoni, Saraki has been the one at the receiving end of the media onslaught sponsored from the office of the EFCC.

He said Dr. Saraki is on firm ground on the points of law, and therefore has nothing to be afraid of.

“While the EFCC claims that it is investigating the Office of the Senate President between 2015 and 2019, we make bold to say that it is just on a wild goose chase. That Office has nothing to do with contract awards and handling of the finances of the National Assembly. These are functions of the bureaucracy of the National Assembly, otherwise known as the National Assembly Management.

Also commenting the persistent probe of the tenure of Dr. Saraki as Governor of Kwara State between 2003 and 2011, Yusuph maintained that all the issues the EFCC are presently raising were the same issues that are contained in four of the charges filed before the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) and taken before the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court.