Governor Umahi Threatens to Kill Peoples Gazette Reporters over Ebonyi Corruption Story

Apparently rattled by Peoples Gazette’s examination of his shady business practices in public service, Ebonyi Governor, David Umahi, has threatened to exterminate the Gazette’s reporters for beaming a spotlight on his sordid financial activities.

The Gazette had in an exclusive report on Friday exposed how Mr. Umahi transferred billions to his private firm from Ebonyi treasury, in brazen disregard for extant code of conduct regulations precluding senior public officials from conducting private businesses, except subsistence agriculture, while in office.

Citing recently obtained financial records of Ebonyi State’s, the Gazette reported a sustained trend of illicit financial flows from the state’s purse to Brass Engineering & Construction Nig. Ltd., a company founded and chaired by Mr. Umahi since 1993.

Brass Engineering, documents showed, had received more than N3.6 billion from Ebonyi coffers between 2011 and 2019.

The Gazette found that Mr. Umahi, who started transferring state funds into Brass Engineering shortly after becoming deputy governor to Martin Elechi in 2011, continued the suspicious transaction with his firm when he assumed governor himself in 2015.

The Gazette’s reporters came under severe security pressure from Mr. Umahi’s aides shortly after the story was published, with attendant requests for the report to be retracted or deleted entirely from our website and servers.