The Nigerian Army has launched situation monitoring room to ensure real-time observation of events during the general elections.
Speaking at the inauguration of the room at the Army headquarters in Abuja, the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, said the army had launched the situation room and Operation Safe Conduct to enable Officers and Personel adopt a “proactive and responsive posture that would allow us to better respond to early signs of insecurity before they could escalate into a major security challenge.”
He said with the situation room in place, the Nigerian Army would activate quick response to security situations between in less than five minutes.
The army chief said the post election violence which characterised previous elections had clearly highlighted the challenges posed by incidents of electoral violence in the country, hence “the need to devise new strategies of stemming such ugly tides or completely eliminating same.”
“Lessons learnt from previous election violence witnessed have categorised the nature or types of violence into three broad categories namely: pre-election violence, violence during elections and post-election violence,” he said.
“Violence at the various phases of elections include thuggery, snatching of ballot boxes and papers or kidnapping…“Having observed this cycle of violence reoccur severally in our past electioneering processes, the Nigerian Army has thus deemed it necessary to adopt a proactive and responsive posture that would allow us to better respond to early signs of insecurity before they could escalate into a major security challenge.”
Buratai noted that fake news and fake propaganda was dangerous to both military operations and democratic process, adding that this had informed various collaborations between the Nigerian Army and various stakeholders.
“The rapid spread of fake news has been responsible for misinformation, thereby having an influence on public sentiment and sow confusion among the electorate or even easily ignite violence during the period of the 2019 General Elections,” Buratai said.
Recently, the Central Working Committee of Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria (BON) during its visit to the Army Headquarters promised to partner with the Nigerian Army to tackle issues of fake news.
Also, at a recent 2-day media conference, the Nigerian Guild of Editors, Nigeria Union of Journalists, Guild of Corporate Online Publishers and Guild of Professional Bloggers pledged to partner with the army to tackles issues bothering on negative propaganda against military operations and fake news.
He said the Nigerian Army, through the Cyber Warfare Command, had been continually engaged in monitoring, identifying and countering various forms of fake news and propaganda being put out by terrorists and subversive elements.
“To further enrich the quality of information during the election monitoring process, the NA would also partner with civil society election monitoring groups and other stakeholders,” he said.
He urged the public to forward “credible information” of security importance via SMS, MMS or WhatsApp to 193 or visithttps://army.mil.ng. and drop their messages.
Earlier, the Acting Commander Cyber Warfare Command, Brig. Gen. Thomas Unokhua, said the setting up of the situation room for round-the-clock monitoring of electoral processes would ensure that “the Nigerian Army formations that would participate in ensuring conducive environment for the elections were kept updated with development in their various areas of responsibilities as it pertains to issues of security.”
