NBC News quotes Africa Center Director J. Peter Pham on the upcoming elections and escalating violence in Nigeria:
Recent suicide bombings in relatively safe areas such as the city of Maiduguri could lower the turnout further, according to Dr. Peter Pham at the Atlantic Council, with civilians fearful of attacks on polling stations by the fiercely anti-democratic Boko Haram.
“You are looking at a situation were at least 1.5 million people could be disenfranchised because of the violence,” said Pham, who is director of the council’s Africa Center. “We have the situation where people are going to have to think hard about whether they want to vote if the person in line behind them is going to blow themselves up.”