A group, One Nigeria Group (ONG) has called on the organisers of the nationwide hunger protests scheduled to hold between August 1 and 10 to jettison the move, saying it might degenerate to a state of anarchy.
Its National President, Muhammad Hassan, in a statement issued Thursday said the protest was a tacit threat to national peace, security of lives and property just like the #endSARS protests that dripped with tears and sorrow a few years ago in this country.
He was of the opinion that nobody should dare thread such a path of melancholy again.
Hassan said: “The protests being claimed to be peaceful by the planners whose identities have yet to be confirmed, is a harbinger of tears and sorrows because it has the likelihood of being hijacked by dissidents to unleash terror on the nation.
“If it shall be peaceful, fine but from the feelers we are getting, it might not be peaceful and should therefore be jettisoned.
“The looming planned nationwide hunger protests being purportedly organised by some groups and individuals smacks of plunging the country into a state of anarchy.
“We call on all Nigerians to rise against it. Security agencies, Groups, Civil Society Organisations, religious leaders, sociopolitical and economic analysts, academics, lawmakers, legal practitioners and stakeholders from different spectrum should rise against it.”
Hassan noted that the doom that the protest might elicit on the country and the citizenry, including the organisers too, has the potentialities of setting the country back and derail it from the socio political and economic development
He, therefore, warned against replicating the bitter experiences suffered by some African countries that adopted protest as a means to fight against misrule.
“Let’s not replicate the scenarios in Kenya, Libya and Sudan where such protests were held but degenerated to anarchy and doom for the countries and the people. We should not copy a bad model that can never become a good model tomorrow. As the giant of Africa, Nigeria is too big to copy a wrong legacy from any small African country,” Hassan said.