Friday, December 2, 2005; Posted: 9:31 a.m. EST (14:31 GMT)

President Olusegun Obasanjo's People's Democratic Party said in a statement that Bayelsa State Governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha's actions are "an assault on the integrity" of the party.

Alamieyeseigha was arrested while on a visit to Britain and charged there on September 15 with laundering £1.8 million ($3.2 million) of stolen Nigerian government funds.

But he slipped out of Britain last month and returned home, where his office makes him immune from prosecution.

Nuhu Ribadu, head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, says Alamieyeseigha left Britain on a phony women's passport and wearing a wig and dress.

Bayelsa's state legislature has begun proceedings to remove the governor from office.

Obasanjo, who on Thursday described the governor's flight as "shameful," has deployed troops to the Bayelsa capital, Yenagoa, and frozen funds due to the state from the federal purse.

Hundreds of demonstrators marched in Yenagoa on Monday calling for Alamieyeseigha's resignation. But he also has supporters in the state.

Obasanjo, elected in 1999 to end more than 15 years of corrupt and brutal military rule, has made the fight against widespread corruption in the country a key objective of his government now in its second four-year term in office.

Several former ministers and a former senate president are currently facing corruption trials in court. A former head of the country's police, Tafa Balogun, last week got a six month jail term after pleading guilty to corruption charges.