[Opinion by abati1990] 2023: Peace accord and the violent campaigners via thecableng
of the political parties for the 2023 general elections signed an accord to give peace a chance, avoid violence and respect the rule of law and order. It was meant to be the first in a series of peace-building efforts by the National Peace Committee which this year expanded its fold, by involving the participation of key figures in corporate Nigeria including Alhaji Aliko Dangote and Mr. Femi Otedola, and other leaders such as the Sultan of Sokoto, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Mr.
It is unfortunate however and most disturbing that the politicians who signed a peace accord in September 2022, and their surrogates as well, are disowning the same accord by conduct and by their utterances. Since September when the Independent National Electoral Commission blew the whistle that campaigns could begin, in fact before then, and thereafter, there have been reports of violence, intolerance, hate speech, foul language, vitriol, abuse, harassment, and general bad faith.
The big threat as we prepare for the 2023 elections is beyond ethnicity and religion, this criminality, that is the desperation of the political profiteers and their agents, the thinking that politics is a zero-sum game. The evidence is again writ large in the language of the politicians and the conduct of their supporters. At the signing of the peace accord, the inspector general of police said openly that the police are ready to keep the peace and protect law and order.