2019: Savanna Centre warns against heating polity

By Tobias Lengnan Dapam Abuja

The Savannah Centre for Diplomacy Democracy and Development (SCDDD) has warned politicians against heating the polity, just as it urges security agencies not to be attached to government.
The Centre in a statement issued yesterday by its Executive Director, Ambassador Abdullahi Omaki, said “As we approach the general elections of 2019, the country has begun to see activities largely consistent with democratic norms yet full of aberrations that threaten democracy itself and our collective aspiration for a stable and progressive nation. If the path of development through democracy is to be guaranteed, recent developments in the polity portend dangers that all men and women of goodwill must strive to avert.
“In 2014, elements of the nation’s security agencies invaded the sanctity of our National Assembly without consequences. Not long ago, the houses of some of our judicial officers were invaded at will. Only last Tuesday (August 7, 2018), some DSS operatives repeated such a brazen act of invading the National Assembly. This time around however, there were consequences: the removal of the DG, DSS and an on-going investigation to unravel, hopefully, the true circumstances behind such an act to permit appropriate sanctions to be taken against all those found culpable to avoid future reoccurrence”.
The statement said “the background of these two separate invasions of NASS is similar: re-alignment of forces by the political actors, jostling for elective political positions in the 2019 elections whose lack of ideological and transparent internal democracy by Political Parties threw up the issue of massive defections in the different political platforms. The resultant outcomes of such acts, including the fear of the possibility for leadership changes in the two chambers of NASS, are at the core of current events, which have heated-up the political temperature across the country.”
Omaki in the statement also expressed worry over the lack of cordial relationship amongst security agencies and urged them not to be attached to the government but represent the interests of the country.