During a meeting of the inter-agency consultative committee on election security (ICCES) on Tuesday, February 21, the National Security Adviser (NSA), Babagana Monguno, revealed that there are plans to exploit naira scarcity in order to incite civil unrest during the upcoming general election.
Represented by Sanusi Galadima, a deputy director, Monguno expressed serious concerns about the increasing violence during election campaigns nationwide, despite the endorsement of a peace accord by all presidential flag bearers.
“This detrimental trend is primarily fueled by the actions of political actors, their sponsored thugs, and other unpatriotic elements. This has further hindered the efforts of security and intelligence agencies to effectively address the existing security challenges in the country, including terrorism and banditry.
It is essential to highlight that the government is well aware of the schemes by domestic subversive elements and their external collaborators to exploit the current socio-economic climate in the country, arising from well-intended government policies, to orchestrate civil unrest during the election.
Therefore, in alignment with the President’s commitment to ensure a peaceful transition of political power to a democratically elected government through free, fair, and credible elections, security agencies have been instructed to ensure lawful deployment and decisively deal with any individual or group involved, irrespective of their status,” he stated.