A former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Yakubu Dogara, has endorsed the efforts aimed at curbing vote-buying ahead of the 2023 general elections. Dogara, who acknowledged the hardship caused by the Naira swap policy, pleaded with Nigerians to endure and consider the inconveniences as a sacrifice for free, fair and credible elections.
“It’s a life lesson: just as injury has pains, so also recovery has pains. But if we have to get healed, we have to endure the pain. I urge us all to trudge on in the hope that these pains may truly be the birth pangs we may endure for a New Nigeria to be born,” he said. He dismissed the criticisms trailing the policy and urged the CBN to ensure the redesigned notes were made available to Nigerians.
“Let me emphatically say that the President has the sole constitutional powers over currency matters and all those busy running their mouths because they have been denied the opportunity to deploy their ill- gotten naira they have stashed to buy votes, that they are committing treason. “The president is absolutely right not to have given in to the greed of the few against the needs of the many. While the president is right to have acted on what he knows and in the best interest of the country, his traducers are petty, unpatriotic, treacherous and grossly irresponsible,” Dogara said.