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The Anambra State Government has escalated its dispute with former governor and Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) presidential candidate, Peter Obi, releasing details of eight external loans it says were inherited from his administration and challenging his longstanding claim that he left more than N75 billion in savings and investments when he handed over in 2014.
The Governor Chukwuma Soludo administration also disputed Obi’s claim that more than N2.13 billion in ecological funds was left intact in a First Bank account, saying a certified statement of the account cited by the former governor did not support his assertion.
Commissioner for Information and Value Reorientation, Law Mefor, who made the claims in a statement on Wednesday, said eight external loan facilities with an original value of $123.77 million were outstanding when Obi left office on March 17, 2014.
According to him, the outstanding balance on the facilities stood at N127.4 billion as of June 30, 2026, at the official exchange rate, with the state continuing to make debt-service payments.
The latest salvo followed an earlier disclosure by Commissioner for Finance, Izuchukwu Okafor, that deductions were still being made from Anambra’s monthly Federation Account allocation to service loans contracted by previous administrations, including those of Obi and his successor, Willie Obiano.
Obi has consistently maintained that rather than leave Anambra financially encumbered, his administration handed over substantial cash and investments when he completed his tenure.
He has said the more than N75 billion comprised cash and investments, including foreign currency holdings, and has maintained that the relevant transactions could be verified from the financial institutions involved.
Giving details, Mefor said the loans covered projects in malaria control, healthcare, education, erosion and watershed management, community and social development, Fadama development and value-chain development.
The commissioner said borrowing was not inherently wrong and could be justified when deployed to infrastructure, bankable projects and human-capital development.
He, however, questioned what the state received in return for the borrowings, alleging that the Obi administration left behind dysfunctional water schemes and challenges in public schools and hospitals.
“We are convinced that many Ndi Anambra would not have minded if HE Peter Obi had borrowed to fix public schools and hospitals, water schemes, infrastructure, or even to reduce poverty and insecurity; debt, especially for bankable projects and human capital development, is justifiable,” Mefor said.
The government also took direct aim at Obi’s claim that he left more than N75 billion in savings and investments for the administration of Obiano.
Mefor challenged the former governor to provide the records supporting the figure, saying the current administration would not accept what he described as “nebulous creative accounting.”
The controversy over what Obi left behind is, however, more than a decade old. His immediate successor, Obiano, also disputed the N75 billion figure, saying his administration inherited about N9 billion in cash and N25.6 billion in bonds and shares, while also alleging that there were outstanding contractual commitments. Obi’s camp maintained that the N75 billion figure represented the totality of cash and investments handed over.
The latest dispute has also shifted to the N2.13 billion ecological fund which Obi says he deliberately left untouched for his successor.
Obi had said the money was released about three months before the end of his tenure for the Oko/Umuchiana erosion crisis and that, despite pressure to spend it, he left it intact because it was tied to a specific project and government was a continuum.
He identified a First Bank account and said its balance exceeded N2.13 billion when he left office, stressing that the amount was separate from the more than N75 billion in savings and investments he says he handed over.
But the Soludo administration said it had obtained a certified statement of the account from its opening in 2011 to date and alleged that it neither received nor held the N2.13 billion claimed by Obi.
Mefor said the account identified by the former governor was an Internally Generated Revenue Consolidated Revenue Account rather than an ecological fund account, and challenged him to show where the ecological money was kept.
The government also disputed Obi’s assertion that he left no salary, pension, gratuity or other obligations behind.
Mefor said the Soludo administration had cleared about N22 billion in inherited gratuity arrears but maintained that legacy liabilities remained from the Obi era and administrations before it. He also alleged that while the Obi administration verified 16 months of salary arrears involving primary school teachers, only five months were paid.
Obi has rejected the claims, insisting that his administration liquidated more than N35 billion in historical gratuities and arrears and that, at handover, Anambra owed no salaries, gratuities or pensions and had no outstanding payments to contractors for duly executed and certified projects.
He has thrown a challenge to the state government to produce evidence contradicting his account, declaring that he would stop campaigning for the 2027 presidential election if his claims were proved false.
The fresh offensive by the Soludo administration has consequently reopened the decade-old controversy over Anambra’s finances at the March 2014 transition — particularly the size and nature of the assets Obi handed over, the liabilities attached to his administration and the whereabouts of the N2.13 billion ecological fund he says he left untouched.
