Abuja: President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Nigeria's armed forces on Thursday warned against Kenya-style violence over planned protests over the cost of living for the next week, which the military said would lead to “chaos”.
Kenya was rocked by deadly protests that forced the government to scrap new taxes. Nigeria's economic reforms have seen a 40 percent spike in food inflation but there has been no unrest.
A call has been made on social media for demonstrations from 1st August.
It is unclear who is behind the calls or the people participating at a time that many Nigerians are wary of job losses and wary of past crackdowns.
President Tinubu addressed the concern in a statement late on Thursday, saying: “We are not afraid of protests. Our concern is the common people, and what will happen is the loss.”
In a separate statement, he said, “We don't want Nigeria to turn into Sudan,” referring to the 15-month-old civil war in the northeast African country.
“We are talking about hunger, not burial. We have to be careful.”
Prices rose after Tinubu ended expensive fuel subsidies and liberalized the naira currency in reforms needed to revive the economy of Africa's most populous nation.
Authorities, security forces and governors have asked youths to stay away from any protests. Some have even accused the organizers of treason and trying to destabilize the country.
“Citizens have the right to protest peacefully, but they do not have the right to mobilize for chaos and spread terror,” defense spokesman Major General Edward Buba told reporters.
“It is easy to see that the contemporary context of planned protests is to overshadow the events in Kenya, which I must call violent,” he added.
The armed forces had discovered some elements to “hijack” the planned protests, he said.
“The level of violence envisaged can only be described as a state of lawlessness. The armed forces on their part will not stand by and allow lawlessness in our nation.”
The Department of State Services or DSS, which handles domestic threats, said “terrorist” elements wanted to exploit the protests and had political motives.
“The conspirators intend to use violent consequences intended to discredit federal and sub-national governments; Make them unpopular and pit them against the people,” it said in a rare statement.
Tinubu, who has repeatedly called for patience over his reforms, has suggested that some groups are mobilizing the movement to fuel violence and repeat Kenyan protests.
On Thursday he met with traditional rulers to seek their help in dealing with any protests.
“We traditional rulers are not out to loot the people, especially the youths, to destroy law and order,” the Ooni of Ife Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi said after the meeting.
The president last week agreed to double the monthly minimum wage for federal workers to 70,000 naira ($43). In an effort to ease the pressure of living, he has started distributing rice trucks to every state.
The last major protest movement in Nigeria, in October 2020, began due to abuses by the SARS anti-robbery police squad, but turned into the largest anti-government demonstration in Nigeria's modern history.
Police units were disbanded but the protest ended in blood.
Witnesses and rights organizations alleged that security forces opened fire on peaceful protesters at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos on October 20, 2020.
Amnesty International said the army killed at least 10 people at the toll gate, but security forces denied responsibility, saying the army used blank rounds to disperse curfew violators.
