By CHARLES IWUOHA

The gubernatorial flagbearer of the Peoples Democratic party (PDP) in Enugu State, Barr. Peter Mbah has denied allegations that he was convicted of financial crimes.

The PDP Guber candidate said he was never convicted or faced any criminal charges in the past as alleged in some quarters.

Mbah has been a subject of discussion in Enugu State, with many claiming that he wriggled out of the hooks of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, through a plea bargain arrangement.

The allegations took another dimension when a video went viral in the State, entitled: ‘Ego Ndi Enugu’, (meaning Enugu people’s money), wherein it was claimed that Mbah’s Pinnacle Oil was established through illicit funds syphoned from the Enugu State public fund.

Mbah was at a time the Chief of Staff to former Governor, Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu State and also commissioner of Finance.

Speaking during a Solid FM radio programme on Saturday, the PDP guber candidate said he was never invited by the EFCC, adding that whereas the commission wrote letters of invitation to some government officials, he went there on his own volition.

He added that the commission held him in a situation that could be best described as “a placeholder” to someone that was of interest to the anti-graft agency.

“I have never been convicted by EFCC, I have never indulged in plea bargain. My name was struck out even before trial commenced.

“I was never tried, I did not request that my name be struck out, the prosecution did it on his own.

“The people who are behind this fake news, if they were interested in knowing the truth, the court records are there,” he said while stating that “I have been a victim of several malicious attacks. People are engaging in a campaign of calumny, maligning me.

“Let them come with any modicum of evidence where I did plea bargain, I was never part of any trial. Ego Ndi Enugu does not exist.”

On the recent National Youths Service Corps, NYSC, certificate forgery allegation against him, Mbah restated that he completed his service after a three month break.

“I did my NYSC. I served and was honourably discharged. I have my discharged certificate. My place of primary assignment was Udeh & Co. I think the confusion was because I had a break. As an overseas graduate, when we were done with our Bar Part I, the next thing was for us to do Bar Part II, but we were just completing Bar Part 1 when the bar final students started.

“So we were encouraged by the then Deputy Director-General (DDG) of Nigerian Law School, Prof. Kole Abayomi, who was the DDG of Lagos Campus where I did my Bar Part I to go and do our youth service. So, we went to start our youth service.

“Eight months into the youth service, we were told to come back to do our Bar Final. We started the Bar Final and the honorable thing for me to do was to basically write to the NYSC to say, “Please, I am going to do my Bar Final and I want to break my service year”. The letter is still documented. So, I went and completed my Bar Final and went back and completed the remaining months of my service.

“I still have the letter of NYSC re-mobilizing me to go and finish from where I stopped. So, when eventually I completed, the certificate I was given has the same date as my original set. Therefore, if you don’t have this background, you will be wondering, ‘You should be in Law School this period, why should you have an NYSC certificate?’

“But just as I said, the documents are all there and can speak for themselves. So, I did my youth service as an honorable person and all these processes were documented and my remaining months was completed and my certificate issued to me by the NYSC,” he disclosed.

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