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The Bayelsa State Commissioner for Finance, Silva Charles
Opuala, who was declared wanted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
(EFCC) two weeks ago, turned himself in to operatives of the commission
yesterday.

Mr. Opuala, alongside two other officials of the state, reported
to the commission yesterday morning and were detained pending their arraignment
in court.

The officials, who were accompanied to the commission’s office
by a team of lawyers led by the Special Adviser to the state governor on Legal
Matters, Dennis Otiotio, arrived at the EFCC investigations department at about
9.50am.

Spokesman of the EFCC, Femi Babafemi, confirmed that the trio
were in their custody.

Mr. Opuala was declared wanted for deliberately refusing to
honour three invitations sent to him by the anti-graft agency to answer
questions concerning the diversion of N2.4 billion, for which charges have also
been filed against four other officials.

Minding government
business

The EFCC had dispatched three letters to Mr. Opuala in March,
but the commissioner chose not to honour the invitation letters and was
reported to have gone into hiding.

The Bayelsa State Commissioner of Information, Nathan Egba,
denies that Mr. Opuala had gone into hiding.

“We wish to state that he is not running away from the law. He
stayed back in Bayelsa based on an agreement between the EFCC and the state
government, in order that all government businesses would not ground to a
halt,” Mr Egba said.

He also added that Mr. Opuala needed to arrange for salaries of
civil servants for the month of March and ‘also make necessary arrangements for
the smooth flow of government business in his absence’ before turning himself
in to the EFCC.

The former finance commissioner and three other senior officials of the
state are facing a six-count charge of money laundering before a High Court in
Abuja.