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| Tony Abolo |
Restructuring is becoming a fancy word in Nigeria’s political
lexicon. It should however be remembered that we were not the only ones to think
about it. Back in 1986, Mikail Gorbachev found that without (perestroika) (restructuring)
and becoming (glasnost)(transparent) about it, the Soviet Union may not survive
global competition. Albeit, we are in the same quagmire, as after 56 years, we
are saying that we either restructure or we implode anytime soon.
Those two key words, (perestroika and glasnost) were the approaches that took the dangerous bear hugs off the Soviet Republic and today the rump of the union, Russia, is the better for it. Whoever now strongly remembers in 2017 that the Soviets stretched into today’s Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania, Uzbekistan, and Georgia? Difficult as it was to contemplate in 1986 for the Soviets, the once unthinkable for us is getting closer to the real. Soviet Union came cascading on Christmas Day in 1991. We too must liberalize in the full meaning of liberalization which is the sweeping away of all “fixed, fast, frozen relations and not just those we dislike”. We must restructure, but then, in what ways?
Certainly not in the ways of the 1978, 1998 and 2014 Constituent Assemblies that were largely driven by ethnic thought processes and anxieties and which lacked the rigor of intellect, sincerity of purpose and futurist planning, and certainly not the flimsiness of the Obasanjo political reform conference, nor the self serving rejection of the Jonathan constitutional conference by President Buhari and his northern irredentists.
No matter how we skirt around it, there is an urgent need for a negotiated political settlement as Nigeria is a behemoth that will never fly. It is bad enough that the North needs to impose itself on the rest of the country, and sitting pretty glum that its Muslim Fulani inspired constitution which entrenches an incongruous unitary Federation (a structure unheard of anywhere in the world) is operationalising in Nigeria, with all its contradictions and imponderables.
For over four decades now, the Yoruba nation has always clamoured for what she calls “fiscal Federalism” which is more or less, a borrowed concept of understanding of relationships in the mould of U.S.A Federalism. This cry has been so outworn and never been a fancied chant over the years and hence it has not cut ice, especially with the North. The North’s fear is encrusted in the anxiety that a fiscal Federalism demand will break up the country and cause them to lose the South, which is a gift to them, Othman Dan Fodio and his descendants from the British as they granted Nigeria independence- a Friedreich Engels and Karl Marxian concept of liberalization. And that is not the only fear of the North, after the civil war, they still live in mortal fear of what a resurgent Igbo nation can do if let to go, given the Biafran experience.
The restructuring clamour has resurfaced again given the first salvo by Atiku Abubakar on May 31st 2016 when at a book launch, curiously titled “We Are All Biafrans”, he argued and correctly so that-
“The structure of the country is heavily
Defective as it does not provide the
enabling environment for growth and
Progress among the 36 component States
of the Federation”
He further recalled and argued that, Nigeria once operated a federal system at independence that allowed the regions to retain their autonomy, raise and retain revenues, promote development and conduct their affairs as they saw fit, while engaging in health competition with others. Deepening his argument further, he said
“Agitation by many right thinking
Nigerians, call for restructuring and
Renewal of our Federation to make it
Less centralized, less suffocating, less dictatorial in the affairs of our
Country’s constituent units and localities”
Nothing could he more persuasive that when he added that
“The call for restructuring is even
more relevant today in the light
of the governance and economic
challenges facing us. And the rising
tide of agitations, some militant
and violent, require a reset in our
relationships as a united nation.
Addressing the flaws in our federation
will help us address some of those
very economic and challenges
facing this country” .
And to come close to those who never see any good in the calls of restructuring, Atiku Abubakar a Northerner from Adamawa, added what may be a clincher--
“An excessively powerful centre
does not equate to national
unity. If anything, it has made
our unity more fragile, our
government more unstable and
our country, more unstable.” In
short it has not served my
part of Nigeria well, and
at risk of reproach, it has
not served my part of the country,
the North, well”
Ever since that May 31st call, it has opened a flurry of thought provoking articles from Nigerians in and outside of the country - as nearly everyone agrees that now is the time to restructure and therefore the need to collate all the strands of thoughts and analysis of the concept of RESTRUCTURING of a hitherto un-working federation – in the hope that the blind mindset of the illiterate cabal members, whoever they are, may see reason.
The thinking now is that by joining issues in matters of public interest that we can achieve definitions, clarifications and fresh insights. With new knowledge, democratic standards are deepened and strengthened and the frontiers of good governance extended.
It was settled back in 1960 as at Nigeria’s independence that for a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society, like Nigeria, that a weak centre and loose regions provide guarantees for national integration and nation building. That was the hope at the start. But the 1966 coup –de- tat and the unification decree of the Aguiyi Ironsi regime shattered all that. With the long years of military rule which ended in 1999, the nation simply grew in the wrong knowledge and assumption that the military command unification model is the way to operate the federation. In practice, an ethnic north with its Sharia imposition, which effectively shuts out social and labour mobility from the wealthier South, certain inclusions in the Constitution which seem to exclude merit, in order to favour a slow and backward political economy of the North has deepened the centrifugal forces in our politics. A fair safeguard of federal character balance in appointments has been shattered and disregarded by a highly clannish and nepotic Buhari and hence nearly everyone in the south is angry at the continued forced union and therefore think that the only way to go is by “Restructuring” and rolling back to either the regions of old and where that is not possible to arrange the federation into the 1995 seemingly settled six geographical Zones as a basis for a new arrangement of federation units.
Equally implied in the anger amongst the southerners is a federal system that will not tolerate accurate census head count (we have never had any) federal constituencies that are lopsided in favour of the North, a situation drawn up by Northern military officers who gave more local governments to a state like Kano which claims to be a city with more local governments than some States in the East. To many, these smack of injustice and inequity, which Northerners do not want to re-dress so long as their part of the country receives more resource allocation based on local governments and land mass. Painfully this gives them more members both in the Senate and in the House of Representatives. This advantage means that whatever the North wants, it gets by an unfair majority vote in the parliament. Justice, fairness and equity in all these matters is what southerners seek and hopefully some right thinking Northerners too.
Because of a 1979-1980 understanding to bring governance, and development to the grass roots, the Obasanjo, Yar’Adua military Administration through a Dasuki Commission Repott, approved the autonomy and financial allocation to lLocal Governments. The action deemed right and appropriate and everyone then often referred to the Local Government system as the third tier of government. As it is usual in Nigeria, the structure was abrogated in the 1999 constitution thus making only the States as the federating unit of the federation. This has led to a complete subsuming of Local Government funds and operations in the States. The suits the thieving politicians who love unaccountability and who love to plant surrogates at the local levels in order to capture power. In the end, poverty is deepened and there is no growth in the 774 local governments in the country. Nigerians who are not politicians are clamouring for a due recognition of the third tier of government and that they be made part of the federating units contrary to what the lawyers would argue that no local government in any federation anywhere in the world is a federating unit. But in our unique history, we see the need, and hence any restructuring should accommodate the local government units. Some have admirably argued that given the primacy of local governments in public administration ,we could structure along local governments and a federal superstructure only. In which case we could delete the States. This it is considered would best localize and deepen our democracy.
Someone so emphatic with the leaner structure argument is Olusegun Philips-Alonge. In write up after write ups, he has bemoaned a large inefficient federal beauracracy, which to him is why we are not developing. Restructuring as used in his context means moving the government closer to the people, giving resource control back to the local communities, reducing the function and reach of the federal government and improving National integration. Essentially a restructured Nigeria will have a small, quick and highly efficient federal government that can perform its regulation of interstate commerce, National security, military, foreign policy, trades and interior integration cheaper and faster. However, restructuring also means the responsibility for the success and failure of government programme will rest solely on the people at the local level.
For Olusegun Philips Alonge, in a paper position which, I thoroughly agree with, the notion that Nigeria is a non-negotiable iron clad entity is naïve, unrealistic and false idea of the ideologue cabals. As renegotiating our existence restructuring our union and repositioning our priorities gives us a better chance of keeping Nigeria together as a successful nation. Our economy is weak and the immediate and long term outlooks are not encouraging as structural inabilities in the financial system kill innovation, enterprise and entrepreneurial spirit needed to compete on a world stage.
It needs no telling that the federation is not working ever since after the 1966 coup. This is more so because of the roles and responsibilities of the Nigerian federal government, which have continued to grow at an alarming rate. The socio-economic challenges from a burgeoning population are more than what can be micro managed from Abuja.
In every democratic capitalist society, systematic delegation of responsibilities to the federating units and the grassroots, improves economic viability and spurs growth. Our current federal structure is too far away from the people it intends to serve and is too occupied to be responsive to the immediate needs of the masses. This is the reason people have urged for such constitutional review to re-examine, in the light of our circumstances, financial health, capacity, population, ethnic fissures such that that we re-jig the fiscal and resource distribution, the constitutional structures of the Exclusive, Concurrent and Residual lists.
From a functionalist or liberal constitutionalist point of view, a political structure exists to solve problems and meet the needs of the people and should be open to reconstruction whenever it cannot perform those functions. And by concomitance, a political system loses its ethical basis if it cannot meet the people’s needs and aspirations.
Truth be told, the present political-governance structure has failed catastrophically. On examination of 53 common wealth countries with similar features like ours, and with diverse nationalities, none has the kind of centralized political structure as Nigeria. Our hangover from our military days seems untouchable because for one the North has a feudal structure and it suits them to use their “false” numerical superiority to filibuster any dismantling moves. Worse than that, is that, younger Nigerians have no experience of a proper federal structure of the 50’s to 60’s. This generation thinks that this present abnormal is the normal; having someone to act like a buccaneering Chief Executive in the name of a President, with all the trappings and powers of a military Commander-In-Chief.
Not tampering with our military handed down constitution and derived political culture has landed us constantly to the brink of anarchy, communal clashes, lack of freewill for inter state co-operation and synergy, a feeding bottle federalism where states go cap in hand for monthly federal allocation rather than home grown solutions for self reliance thus perpetuating economic dislocations, poverty in the midst of plenty and the agony of living with potentially rich states that must depend on the centre for sustenance. Our prolonged giant life with a feet of clay is because of the pangs of nation building arising from a structural paradigm deject, traceable to the structure and history of the Nigerian society.
What have we harvested over the years? Corruption, Graveyard state, Politics of self interest, Massive unemployment, Lack of labour and Social mobility, Insecurity, Massive population un-indexed with patriotism and spirit of enterprise and adventure, so sorely needed to rejuvenate a society.
Must we seat and wait out our Armageddon? So many think, we should not. We then must restructure along some quick wins. – Through some foremost constitutional reforms. We must work to reduce the power of the central government which results in the centrifugal arrangement whereby the outposts of governance-States and local governments-and the citizens can engage in creative enterprise for wealth generation, growth and development. A state and local policing is urgently needed to stem instabilities without needing clearance from the centre. If this was in place, the unruly gang of herdsmen would have been long contained. Also the menace of Boko Haram may not have exacerbated and allowed to fester.
Not addressing the tenure of Presidents and Governors is becoming a source of aggressive and acquisitive political culture. The two term tenure has resulted in a do or die politics with politicians and citizens lured into politics and office by the prospects of pomp, power and opulence. This has led to what the Beninoise President Talon describes as “Presidential or (gubernatorial) complacency” . Alongside this must be abolished two twin corruption breeding attitude in governance - Executive immunity and the secret vault of “security votes” which is an open license for unending stealing by State Governors.
People are asking fervently must we have a bi-cameral legislature? What good does it do? In the midst of unemployment, lean resources, do we need 109 Senators and 360 members of House of Representatives? Given the quality of debates and the unaccountable funds sunk into constituency projects and the humungous sums paid to legislators as emoluments and allowances at all levels of the present structure, should if not be prudent to revisit the issue of size and crunch the numbers?
However a key question we just do not want to touch is the duplications and high cost of governance in Nigeria in view of the 36 States structure. The logic of efficiency or cost of governance argument is making a returning to regionalism very compelling, even if not to the old 4 regional structure or a 6 regional structure, which will induce comparative size advantage, a reduced beauracracy, improved revenue and reduced costs. According to Emeka Anyaoku, the current system with the multiplicity of government administrative structures drains the limited resources and stultifies growth. Nigeria will be stronger when its federating units or nations are strong. A return to regionalism will ensure that. The States, excepting three, as at December 2016, (Lagos, Enugu and Rivers) are practically insolvent. We deceive ourselves if we think we can have profilgate governance system in 36 largely solvent states, each having extensive and expensive administrative structures and borrowing heavily to build white elephant projects. We have States that are reliant on the centre and on borrowing to function. Those are not signs of a true federation. What goes on in each of the state can be better carried out at regional levels to achieve economies of scale and efficiency.
Significantly, Nigeria needs a political settlement .The country has not had a proper negotiated political arrangement about how people should leave peacefully together, how power should be organized and exercised to generate political stability and how the institutions and the economy can work harmoniously to promote sustainable growth and development, argues Olu Fasan. Without such determinations of political settlement, the preconditions for good governance will be absent.
Dangerously, we have retained a structure that panders to our ethnic tendencies by our retention of the 36-State structure that ensures homogenous ethnic nations stay together rather than dismantling such tendencies and seek for a more progressive national integration drive by a constitutional fiat. The expectations are that such restructuring will release the latent potentials for growth by the regions which decree 34 of 1966 and subsequent balkanization over the years by successive military regimes in the false hope of driving down development merely perpetuated distortions and ethnic loyalties which do not help nation building. This loyalty to one’s ethnic origins and religion makes leadership at the centre hardly accorded any national acceptance and in a backlash, whoever is the “national leader” surrounds himself with only trusted ethnic brethren which breeds lack of trust and cooperation in others about National policies and programmmes.
At the risk of over repetition, the current arrangements results in underdevelopment, inequity, bad blood, corruption, maladministration, incompetence, ineptitude and indolence. The states as constituted as we knows them, argues Ike Ekwemadu, the current Senate Deputy President, are not platforms for wealth creation but for wealth sharing. In turn, a state with more local governments has a greater chunk of the “national cake” every month. It is this, that he, Ekweremadu describes as robbing Peter to pay Paul- a feeding bottle federalism. This is best seen when Lagos State generates more to the economic productivity pool, more value added tax revenue to the national pool, while Borno, Yobe and Jigawa States for example, with little to show in terms of population and economic activities are heavily dependent from the distributable pool at the centre. Should we have instituted fiscal federalism, and each state was to produce and send to the centre distribution pool, we then can expect each state to rise to the challenges of full potentials of development. Poverty is being deepened when states cannot tap into their innate potentials and with a centre that now has less to distribute, more so with a negative, frugal, insipid directionless management style of Buhari, poor states are poorer and the nation is being dragged to when economic challenges make states anxious and uncertain, their citizens restless and sometimes restive ,worse still, unproductive.
What seems to make the arguments very urgent has been the mortal fear of the non-muslim sections of Nigeria of an Islamization agenda. Despite all denials both during the presidential campaign period and even now, since two years in the saddle, there seems to be a haste and brazen behavior to Islamize Nigeria. The acts of the armed herdsmen, their callous killings, the stony silence of President Buhari afterwards, and the appointments of only Fulanis and Northerners as heads of the security architecture gives credence to the threat. Like many, others, Nigerians in the South and Middle Belt consider the urgency of either a restructuring or a safe dismemberment of the country for the sake of peace.
Now when one reads that a few years back, there was a clandestine “Abuja Declaration “ in (2010) where Northern Muslims in league with outside Jihadists have consented to drive deeper the global Islamization agenda and to execute the Nigerian aspect in a surreptitious manner. The way Buhari had campaigned in years past with a promise that if he does not win – “monkeys and baboons will soak in blood”. His politics and urge to the Northerners to reclaim “power”, is all within the context of his perception of Northern Domination. Now he has the power, his incompetence and single minded drive to recover stolen monies in a Sharia minded approach, the nepotistic appointments and dictates, the interpretations of his cousin who did Economics over 50years ago to dictate economic policies without the benefit of a nationwide policy input, has revealed his hands of a jihadist agenda.
Then when one reads all of these into Chinweizu’s “Goals of the Caliphate Jihadists” as published in May 2016- an article he prefixed with “This is a Red Alert”, every non- muslim Nigerian must be alarmed to demand immediate restructuring. Hear him
Nigeria’s democratic secularists
and Nigerian Christians have been
deluding themselves for the past several
decades that they can cohabit Nigeria,
in mutual toleration with the Caliphate
Jihadists. That is why they have never
raised themselves to stop making
concessions to those who have been
“advancing Sharia”, one step
at a time since 1960. Because
they have not bothered to enlighten
themselves about those they have
bent backward to accommodate,
they have been “mumus” (foolish)
and are now on the brink of
final defeat by an enemy they
have refused to see as an enemy,
and have insisted on seeing as
partners in the so called Nigeria
project”
For avoidance of all doubt and
an end to any illusion of
accommodating or harmonizing
Islam with secular democracy,
Christianity or African polytheism,
here is an explanation of the
goals of Islam given by no
less an authority than the late
Ayatollah Khoimeni-
“Islam makes it incumbent on
Adult males…. To prepare themselves
for the conquest of other countries
so that the writ of Islam is obeyed
in every country of the world…
…Islam says: kill them (the non-muslims),
put them (the non-muslims) to the sword and scatter
their armies….”
“We shall export our revolution to the whole world, until the cry “ Allahu Akbar” resounds over the whole world”
The Southerners and Middle Belters were noting when Boko Haram pledged loyalty to ISIS. They are also observant when Kaduna Governor, diminutive EL- Rufai claims to have paid monies to herdsmen located outside Nigeria’s shores to appease them for cattle rustling and herdsmen killings in Nigeria. They read into all of these as signs of possible things to come. Nothing is being discarded as the Fulanis seem unrelenting in their motives. Perhaps their concept of restructuring is either that of dominating the entire country, Othman Dan Fodio Jihad style, a break-up of the country or an all out civil war should any part of the country offer resistance.
And if that is not the meaning of restructuring for the Fulanis, what other meaning can we derive from public discourses or popular agitations around the clamour for “Restructuring”? This may not be an unnecessary enquiry as the Vice-President, Professor of Law, Yemi Osinbajo, a Yoruba – a man from the ethnic group that has been clamouring for restructuring for decades, says he himself does not understand what is the content and context of “Restructuring” in 2016.
On September 1st 2016, in an article “What are we Restructuring?” by Mohammed Tukur Usman, on the back page of “This Day”, after examining all the brick bats in the restructuring arguments, which seems to have arisen when Francophone West African Countries were going through their Sovereign National Conferences in the 80s, through the NADECO and PRONACO statements, to fiscal federalism arguments of over 25years ago, which mimics the early 60s’ Federal Government revenue and sharing formula to the regions while allowing the regions to retain their revenue and grow at their own pace, concludes by asking, how come we never ever think of GOOD GOVERNANCE as the reason to demand restructuring? Because as he argues, if there was good governance in Nigeria, would any ethnic group or interest groups ever think of restructuring Nigeria? A great thought. So why are we not demanding that?
Yakubu Mohammed in a back page comment in the “Guardian” on August 2016, harped on the Theme of Leadership, which is a sore and deeply missing link in the running of Nigeria. This is the bane that gets each group so dissatisfied with every tenure outcomes that we rush to call for-Restructuring. Said Yakubu Mohammed
“And until the issue of
leadership is resolved,
the Nigerian question cannot
be adequately and satisfactorily
answered.
Since the return to democratic
Rule in 1999… we have
suffered greatly from leadership
deficit. Many of the leaders
at all levels of government came
into office grossly ill prepared.
The fault, is in the leadership
recruitment process. Many
leaders emerge today without
serving any apprenticeship.
The crown goes to the highest
bidder, not necessarily the
best and most prepared to serve.
“The style of the present government
is not helping the unity of the
country. Everything is done to
elevate some part of the
country and trample upon others”.
“The upsurge in the clamor
for restructuring of Nigeria
has been blamed on what
analysts described as the
poor governance style of the
Mohammadu Buhari Administration.
The government of All Progressive
Congress (APC) may have driven the
different geo-political zones of the
country further apart owing to
the” Doctrine of partiality”, being
adopted by the Buhari administration
in particular and the party’s failure
to meet its campaign promises
Some analysts also believe that
the agitation for restructuring
of the country is a metaphor
for Nigeria’s frustration with the
Federal Government.
“ Our problems are multifaceted,
covering economic, political
and social and the solution
must be multi-dimensional
in approach…. We
must diagnose the problems
and proffer workable solutions
in order to avoid plunging
our economy into full depression.
Pertinent questions must be
asked, where did we go wrong?
More importantly, how do we
comprehensively restructure
Nigeria in a way that will
support our aspirations for a
productive and egalitarian
economy, a stable polity
and a fairer society. There
is need for a reality check”.
The fact that all the political
restructuring initiatives to date
have not addressed Nigeria’s
problems is evidence that the
problems are structural (And
substantially economy).
First, he refuses to look into the 2014 Jonathan organized national conference report believing it was a southern inspired conference. As a northerner, his position is to oppose it without looking at the merits and demerits despite the huge cost incurred in organizing the conference, adjudged by many, as dealing with the “true federalism” structure and inter ethnic harmony.
Secondly, despite our more than 100 years of bumpy nationhood, Buhari dared the aggrieved ethnic nationalities by repeating the Fulani mantra, that Nigeria’s unity is non -negotiable. That has been a sore issue. It is more of a Fulani, Arewa Consultative Forum and Military mind set thinking and hence such pronouncements increases anger in the land and drives the call for a break-up or at least a restructuring or a halfway house for a confederal arrangement.
In response to Buhari’s sectional statement, the Ijaw youth Council describes the statement as “Old fashioned approach to the resolution of national problems”. The apex south west socio-political organization, Afenifere describes the views as a misreading of the country’s mood, while the Igbo umbrella body, Ohaneze Ndigbo reacts by calling for a “review of the terms of the country’s unity”.
The window of opportunity luckily is still open in that, no ethnic nation is calling for a total dissolution of the union. Rather, the hope is that we restructure in order to order to move the country to its manifest destiny. As if in tandem with that line of thinking, an Afenifere Chieftain, Ayo Adebanjo in September 2016 is quoted to have heard what a former U.S state secretary said to Northern Nigerian leaders, when he visited and later invited them to the United States. John Kerry was said to have warned the Northern leaders that they should ensure restructuring of the country and that if they refuse, they will not be able to handle the consequencies.
Wise counseling seem to be weighing in. Elder Statesman, Emeka Anyaoku is encouraging the youths to be part of the agitation as they own the future and therefore
“ You should mobilize and
channel some of your
youthful enthusiasm into
clamouring for a restructuring
of the country’s governance
architecture in order to
realize a truer federalism
that will give the country
greater political stability
and faster socio-economy
development”
“Restructuring Nigeria is
a necessity and a reality
we must live up to. It
is a fact that Nigeria as
a federation is not functioning
as it is supposed to and
the 36 states structure,
bi-cameral parliament is
too expensive for our federation.
“I would support the restructuring
of Nigeria in such a way that
would ensure justice and
equity for the component units.
Whoever wants a new system…
and I believe that if it has to
be changed, there must be a
cogent reason”.
“Restructuring the country was
of necessity”.
And even more recently in February 2017 from the North- Professor Ango Abdulahi, a former Vice Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University and a spokesperson of the Northern Elders Forum, a think tank for the 19 Northern States, stoked the settled dust for the splitting of Nigeria into constituent units by saying-
“ The North is not afraid of the
break-up of Nigeria. In fact the
North is ready for Nigeria’s break-up.
If anybody tells you that the large
informed opinion in the North is against the
dissolution of Nigeria, is telling you lies”
The ethnic nations-especially the Igbos, in a reaction to over 40 years of post war marginalisation are strindent in their cry for justice and restructuring.
One important train we missed was the Abacha still born 1994/ 1995 Constitution. Gen Abacha’s death robbed Nigerians of the opportunity of consigning the hot air over marginalization. The Draft 1995 constitution which was to have been promulgated in 1998 addressed some enduring challenges. The legacies would have been, the official definition of the 6 geo-political zones, the extra 6 states, one each from the six geo-political zones to have been created in a fiat, and there was to have been provisions for six principal officers of five years single term duration that were to rotate among the six zones. In practical terms, and in strict adherence to the principle of rotation envisaged by the Abacha document, at no point in time would any zone have complained of marginalization, since there will always be one “juicy” office to be vied for by each of the six zones every five years. In the document, aside from the office of the President, Vice President, Senate President and House Speaker, there was provision for the office of a prime minister and deputy. What was also envisaged was the elimination of the incumbency factor and the abuses associated with it.
No use in any case to cry over spit milk .What extra to look forward to is the agitations from all those concerned for a greater Nigeria in the hope that the pressure will create the political will that would kick up the process for – not any more amendments, but a brand new constitution which radically restructures the country. What we need in the words of Ayo Opadokun, a former secretary general of the National Democratic Coalition is the convocation of a Sovereign National Conference, a position, Pofessor Ango Abdulahi also advocates. It is for a Conference which would grant Nigerians, the democratic rights to sit together and fashion out waysfor a National Restructuring. The present National Legislators are too whimsical, partisan,ethnic,selfish and lack the genuine legitimacy to give birth to the Nigeria of our hopes.
The hopes of the outcome of such a Sovereign Conference would be in the words of Atiku Abaubakar, in a paper he delivered at a Conference on “Challenges of National Integration and Survival of Democracy in Nigeria”
“National integration, to me, simply means
the process by which different
components of a country with
economic, political and cultural
links, develop a sense of nation hood,
of unity, of oneness ,of interdependence,
irrespective of their different histories, experiences, ideologues, and cultural
values and practices.
Such a sense of nation hood and
oneness encourages a commitment,
by the people to
the survival of the nation and its values and principles,
cultures and territorial integrity.
While we are all dithering, the Yoruba nation has made their choice public. In July2016, the Yorubas converged in Ibadan and while demanding for restructuring at the 50th Remembrance Anniversary of Col Adekunle Fajuyi said-
“Any delay in this regard
Would force the region to opt for secession from the
Federation of Nigeria.
TONY ABOLO
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