About 13 registered political parties in Nigeria have threatened to withdraw from the February 25 and March 11 general elections if the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, extends its deadline for the swap of old currencies for new ones.
Recall that the apex bank had fixed February 10 as the deadline for the swap, following the extension of the January 31 deadline.
DAILY NIGERIAN reports that despite the extension, accessing the new notes has become difficult for many Nigerians.
The CBN governor, however, insisted that the new deadline would not be extended.
But while addressing a press conference on Monday in Abuja, the coalition of chairmen of the political parties warned that they won’t be interested if the deadline was extended beyond February 10, as demanded by some governors and chieftains of the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Speaking on behalf of the parties, the national chairman of the Action Alliance, AA, Kenneth Udeze, faulted the Kaduna, Kogi, and Zamfara state governments for heading to the Supreme Court to get a court injunction to extend the deadline for the validity of three old notes.
Mr Udeze said: “We hereby announce that at least 13 out of the 18 political parties in Nigeria will not be interested in the 2023 general elections, and indeed, we shall withdraw our participation from the electoral process if these currency policies are suspended or cancelled or if the deadline is further shifted.”
