A rights group, International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law, popularly called Intersociety, has warned against creating unnecessary tension ahead of the November 8 governorship election in Anambra State.
Intersociety stated this in a statement on Wednesday, expressing concern over the heightening anxiety in the state occasioned by military and police activities.
The statement was jointly signed by Mr Emeka Umeagbalasi, Head, Intersociety; Obianuju Joy Igboeli, Head, Dept. of Civil Liberties and Rule of Law and Chidinma Udegbunam, Head, Dept. of Campaign and Publicity.
The group urged the Nigeria Police Force and the Nigerian Armed Forces “to totally refrain from threatening and scaring away registered voters in Anambra State numbering 2.82m with over 2.5m of them as PVC holders.”
Intersociety said such threatening of fire and brimstone on air, if continued, would scare away many, if not most of the 2.5m PVC holders and “stop them voting governorship candidates of their choice in the State Governorship Election holding on Nov 8, 2025 which is in three days’ time and return the State to the rank of the governorship election lowest voting State in Nigeria”.
It said its observation had shown that such “gun-culture threats” had become a recurring decimal in the Anambra Governorship polls since the 2000s.
“This, the named security agencies had consistently done or engaged in using militarization and weaponization of voting environments and stifling of civic spaces especially through the so called “show of force,” including open street patrols with armoured tanks, RPGs, explosives and war battle ready officers and personnel who go about singing war songs and using death threatening words in voting environments and other open arenas especially in broad daylight.
“The deployed or drafted security agencies and their officers and personnel also engage in reckless and massive issuance of inflammatory and threatening statements and allied media boasts using lethal words such as “crushing troublemakers”, “neutralising hoodlums”, etc; followed by public parading of hundreds of arrested persons in a bizarre and inhuman manner (stripped half naked and inflicted with bruises).
“From available records, the security forces have been joined to make voting environments very hostile for vulnerable voters by non-state actors including separatist agitators, politically sponsored thugs and other violent entities. This was especially the case across the State in 2013, 2017 and 2021.
“We,, therefore call on the authorities of the Nigeria Police Force and the Nigerian Army or military across Anambra and South-East to ensure that their pre-election and election day security operations and law enforcements are well coordinated by being proactive, scientific, tactically noiseless and intelligence-driven, capable of ensuring that Anambra voters massively turnout and securely and safely vote candidates of their choice in the Nov 8, 2025 governorship poll.”
