From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), yesterday, alleged a plot by leaders of the All Progressives Congress ( APC) to swap N22.5billion old Naira notes to new ones in Kano State.
The opposition party, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, alleged the ruling party was planning to use the money for vote buying in the North West and part of North East in the forthcoming election.
The PDP claimed the “clandestine” Naira swap plot was responsible for the scarcity of the new Naira notes.
It further alleged that old notes in N1,000 denomination had been moved to an old generation and a new generation bank where the regional heads were contacted by the APC Presidential Campaign to swap the old notes with new ones.
“There are intelligence that arrangement has been concluded by APC leaders to move a substantial part of the old naira notes from Kano to Lagos State between today and tomorrow for the purposes of swapping them with new ones. It would be recalled that the PDP had earlier alerted Nigerians that corrupt APC leaders are compromising the system to mop up the new bank notes for their selfish vote-buying plans ahead of the February 25, 2023 presidential election. The PDP therefore alerts the security agencies and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) of this nefarious activity by APC leaders which is bringing untold hardship to Nigerians.
“Our party demands an immediate action to stop APC in this criminal act as well as to recover the money and make the new Naira notes available to the public. The PDP calls on all Nigerians to firmly resist the APC in this heinous attempt to buy their conscience and subject them to another harrowing tenure of killings, violence, kidnapping and economic hardship that have become the hallmark of the APC administration in the last seven and half years,” Ologunagba said.