I spent N40 million in my presidential campaign…let Tinubu and others declare their campaign expenses—Sowore

The African Action Congress (AAC) has challenged candidates of other political parties to borrow a leaf from their presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, and make public their campaign financing sources and expenses utilised in the just concluded 2023 general elections.

AAC made this call in a statement signed and issued yesterday by their National Publicity Secretary, Femi Adeyeye.

In a document released by the party, over N40 million was donated to fund AAC’s presidential campaign, with about N38.3 million realised from donations, and the rest of about N1.8 million coming from Sowore’s personal funds.

According to AAC and the Sowore Political Action Committee (SPAC), the public release of the final breakdown of the 2023 Presidential election campaign donations, sources of finance, and expenditure is in keeping with best campaign practice and the spirit of accountability.

“Recall that the committee gave monthly updates during the campaign and this is not the first time the committee will be releasing a breakdown such as this. In 2019, the AAC candidate also released a complete breakdown of campaign expenses, the first recorded in the history of electioneering campaigns in Nigeria’s history.”

According to the party, the sum of N40,146,674.53 was received as income while N40,193,546.03 was expended for the campaign. And as of March 31, 2023, the sum of N90,101.21 balance was in its bank account.

Explaining how the donor’s money was spent, SPAC said N5,030,000.00 was spent on campaign action/party activities; N1,233,623.89 for subscription; N3,198,000.00 on printing cost; N2,500,000.00 on media logistics and N21,065,820.00 for conveyance.

The group added that N2,290,000 was used for security and other volunteers, N1,627,000 for maintenance cost, N20,000 for consumables, N1,343,800 for welfare and N80,302.14 for bank charges during the period.

The breakdown of expenses from the personal funds, which was N1,805,000 include: N200,000 for printing cost, N1,535,000 for conveyance and N70,000 for maintenance cost.

The Campaign Organisation, therefore, challenged other presidential candidates, including President Bola Tinubu, to release their campaign finances.

“We sincerely hope that those who sought public donations during the campaign season will also show to Nigerians the donations they got from the campaign donors across Nigeria and beyond.

“We can’t have a clean leadership recruitment process in this country with people who shroud their campaign spending in secrecy. We believe that those who can’t keep books of campaign expenses and transparently account for the expenses incurred can’t run a country like Nigeria properly.”