#EndBadGovernance protest sponsors on watch list: Immigration CG

Kemi Nandap, the Comptroller General of the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS), announced that sponsors of the #EndBadGovernance protests residing abroad are now on a watch list and will be arrested upon entering Nigeria.

This announcement was made on Tuesday during a joint news conference in Abuja, which was attended by heads of security agencies and Service Chiefs, including the Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Christopher Musa, at the Defence Headquarters.

Nandap’s statement underscores the government’s intensified scrutiny of individuals involved in organizing and funding the protests, signaling a firm stance against perceived threats to national security.

She said “We have identified some diaspora sponsors, they are on our watch list.

“Any attempt they make to come into the country, we will be notified and they will be picked up and handed to the appropriate authority”.

The immigration boss said the service had, in response to the protest, deployed more officers to borders both land and airports to ensure effective manning of those entry ports.

She said that NIS had also stepped up surveillance to prevent foreign intervention in the country.

The Inspector-General of Police, Mr Kayode Egbetokun, also said that the police had uncovered some sponsors but declined giving further information on them.

Egbetokun said that some accounts of such individuals had been blocked, adding that “many of them reside abroad”.

Also, the Director General, Department of State Services, Mr Yusuf Bichi, represented by the service’s spokesman, Mr Peter Afunanya, said that the service was monitoring those concerned.

He added that the service was also working with the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit to identify more persons behind the funding of the protest.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the defence chief led the service chiefs and heads of all the security, intelligence and paramilitary agencies to brief newsmen on the nationwide protest.

The briefing came a day after President Bola Tinubu met with the security chiefs on the security situation following the violence that broke out during the protests across the country.