Nigeria’s secret police, the State Security Service (SSS), has invited a spokesperson of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Femi Fani-Kayode, over a comment he made on alleged coup plot.
Mr Fani-Kayode, in a statement on Monday, confirmed the invitation by the SSS and also pledged to honour it.
Mr Fani-Kayode, via a tweet last week, alleged that the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, met secretly with some serving military generals. He said the meeting could be part of a plan to destabilize the country and pave the way for a coup d’etat.
“Is this meeting part of the wider agenda to disrupt the elections, destabilise the country, set us on fire, incite chaos and violence, provoke a coup d’etat and establish a new and unconstitutional order in our beloved country under the auspices of an ING?,” Mr Fani-Kayode’s tweet reads.
The Nigerian Army already denied the alleged secret meeting with Atiku and described it as “wicked and very malicious propaganda”.
It also said it was loyal to the government.
“Some members of the main opposition party have since called for the arrest of Mr Fani-Kayode over the comment.
In the past couple of weeks some members of the ruling APC, including serving governors have been floating the idea of fifth columnists working within the presidency to sabotage the party during the forthcoming general elections. The conspiracy theory became louder following the scarcity of Naira notes occasioned by the CBN policy.
Mr Fani-Kayode, a former aviation minister, said the SSS gave him 48 hours to appear before them “otherwise the worse may happen.”
He further disclosed that he earlier dismissed an invitation sent to him via text message but that an official letter had been addressed to him by the secret police.
He stated that even though some persons within the Atiku’s campaign have called for his arrest, the sequence of events shows that the SSS was not under the influence of anyone but merely doing their job.
“Clearly the DSS were not influenced by Atiku and were simply doing their job by inviting me on a matter that needs explanation and clarification and for a thorough interrogation.
“And of course being a responsible and law-abiding citizen I will present myself before them accordingly,” he said.
Mr Fani-Kayode maintained his innocence on the comment made, noting that he just raised questions in reaction to a news publication.
“For the record, I have said or done nothing wrong or that I should not have said or done and I stand by everything that I have said or written in the past on all issues.
“It is not a crime to express my concerns about the despicable activities of Atiku who, in my view, has a hidden agenda and who is so desperate for power that he is prepared to do anything and turn the whole country upside down in order to achieve it,” he said.
Nigeria has a long history of military interventions. Since independence, there have been a total of eight military coups d’état, two were unsuccessful.
The current Fourth Republic is the longest democratic rule the nation has had without military incursion. Democracy was restored in the country in 1999.