Out-going Governor of Delta State, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan has said the disappearance of the state’s Accountant-General, Mr Cyril Agbele, six days to his hand over to a new administration was in bad faith.

The Governor who stated this Thursday when Permanent Secretaries and retired Permanent Secretaries paid him a farewell visit at Government House, Asaba expressed surprise that after a fruitful discussion on arrangements for the inauguration of the new administration including security and entertainment, the Accountant-General made himself incommunicado.

According to him, “the Accountant General has disappeared in the last five – six days. The truth is that on Thursday we met and I told him we have some payments to make in the areas of the swearing-in ceremony coming up tomorrow (Friday), he did not object, he did not say no and on Sunday, I was calling him but he was not picking my calls.”

“And of course on Monday his phones have been put off and on Tuesday, he sent in a paper that he was sick. By Wednesday, he sent in a memo and I find this act very inconsistent and irresponsible,” he stated.

“If there is something that I am doing that is not right, he should be free to tell me it is not right rather than disappearing … just imagine running the affairs of the state for a week without funds, even security men have started withdrawing from their posts across the state.”

“You know the security implication of this, particularly when peace and security is a key agenda of my administration and I cannot compromise on it. It is a conspiracy to grind my administration to a halt and an attempt to set me up on a collision course with the incoming administration. I think it’s very irresponsible.”

Governor Uduaghan challenged the Permanent Secretaries to be good mentors to others, observing that civil servants were key to the growth of the country.
“Permanent Secretaries are very key to the growth of the country, I am very grateful that you remember to say thank you for the little I have done for you, I do know that most countries that have succeeded did so because of their strong civil service. At a time in this country, there was a strong civil service, whatever industry this country had was made possible by civil servants.”

Continuing, Governor Uduaghan said, “mentoring the younger ones in the Ministry is very important, that is one of the reasons I was very keen on employing children of retired Permanent Secretaries because their parents can be their mentors, civil servants should be bold enough to also tell their boss the truth.”

Earlier, the Head of Service, Mr Patrick Origho told the Governor that the civil servants were happy with his antecedents as Governor of Delta State and wished him well in his future endeavour. High point of the occasion was the presentation of gifts to the Governor by the serving and retired Permanent Secretaries.