[size=14pt]Fashola’s office burgled, N4m stolen[/size]
By Nosike Ogbuenyi, 08.16.2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008

The Alausa Oval Office of Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State was rattled Tuesday night as thieves allegedly stole their way into the usually guarded office and carted away millions of naira and documents.





The ugly incident however occurred while the governor was out of the country. He is due to return tomorrow.

Sources at Lagos State Secretariat in Ikeja put the amount stolen at about N4 million.

The money was said to have been removed by the thieves who burgled the office of the Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Lanre Babalola, where it was kept.

When THISDAY called at the secretariat yesterday, it was observed that the incident was being discussed in hushed voices by stupefied workers many of whom pointed accusing fingers at insiders in the fortified office.

The discovery of the theft has thrown operatives in the governor’s office into confusion, resulting in unusual denial of access to many visitors and even some unfamiliar workers to the building.

It was reliably gathered that two security officials suspected to have carried out the criminal operation have been arrested, while the sum of N3 million was allegedly recovered from them.

It was further learnt that that the stolen money was set aside for the governor’s escorts and was kept in the custody of an officer popularly known as Golf Sally (General Commander).

“The Golf Sally is a retired police officer who worked with the former Governor Bola Tinubu. He is still in the service now because he is a good person. He is the one who normally pays the escorts but when he got to where he kept the money he could not find it. He quickly cried out. Now two people have been arrested while investigation continues,” a source said.

Efforts by THISDAY to reach the State Commissioner for Information, Mr. Opeyemi Bamidele for his comment on the incident could not yield result as he did not answer our phone calls. When our correspondent visited the office of the Chief of Staff, Mr. Babalola, he similarly was not around. However, the Senior Special Assistant (Media) to the governor, Mr. Hakeem Bello who was contacted through phone denied knowledge of the theft.

http://odili.net/news/source/2008/aug/16/218.html

Madam give us another story please.

This story has been denied by the LASG and classified as RUMOR.

It was in the papers yesterday