The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has warned President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress (APC) not to drag the Nigerian military into a needless conflict with the Niger Republic.
PDP in a statement by the National Publicity Secretary Debo Ologunagba, accused Tinubu of ulterior motives, by allegedly insisting on drafting Nigerian soldiers into the Niger Republic in defiance of the disapproval by the National Assembly and Nigerians across the board.
The party alleged the president’s motive is to import crisis and destabilise the country “for political reasons.”
It noted that “While the PDP frowns at the unconstitutional change of government in any part of the world, our party holds that the situation in Niger Republic does not warrant any external peace-keeping effort and does not constitute any threats whatsoever to our national interest to justify committing our already overstretched military to harm’s way in a needless war.
“The insistence of the APC government to go to war in the Niger Republic is already heightening tension in Nigeria.”
PDP added that there are insinuations that the APC is only desperate to deploy the military to the Niger Republic so as to provoke possible external aggression from that country, “thereby orchestrating a situation for the declaration of a state of emergency in Nigeria with the tendency to cripple the judicial process on the 2023 presidential election and divert attention from the hardship the APC has foisted on the nation in the last two months.
“It is apparent that the APC is desperate to orchestrate a situation of ‘imminent danger of invasion or involvement in a state of war’ so as to have the excuse to declare a state of emergency under Section 305 (3) (a) and (b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended).”
The party wondered why the APC administration is eager to go to war in the Niger Republic while it has turned a blind eye to the insecurity situation in the country, “even with the mindless killing of over 500 innocent Nigerians in Plateau, Benue, Niger, Kaduna and other States of the federation since May 2023.
“Also distressing is that the APC is ready to deploy billions of naira to prosecute a needless war despite our ailing national economy, crippled production sector, energy crisis, massive unemployment, frightening fall in the value of the naira and excruciating hardship in the country occasioned by its ill-informed, hasty and ill-implemented policies.
