Governor Rochas Okorocha

By Alex Enumah

Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State has said that while it was worthwhile to review the constitution of the country to make it more workable, there was need to mount a massive re-orientation to enable the people imbibe good values that would drive economic and political development.

He said at the Political Parties Summit organised by the National Orientation Agency (NOA) in Owerri that there was need for a positive shift in political culture across Nigeria to complement the on-going constitutional review even as he was emphatic that Nigeria will always remain one strong, united and indissoluble nation despite prediction from some quarters of the nation’s disintegration by 2015.

The Governor was of the opinion that the present structure of federalism in Nigeria, with so much power concentrated at the centre, was programmed to fail because it negates the ideals of the concept of true federalism.

A statement by the Chief Press Secretary of the NOA, Mr. Paul Odenyi, said Okorocha called for a constitutional devolution of powers that would empower state governments to effectively administer the states for development but was quick to note that such devolution must be accompanied with a positive transformation of the mindset of politicians and political parties as the NOA has set out to achieve.

Okorocha who commended the Agency for “taking the bull by the horn” to change the psyche of political parties from the usual politics of rancour to one that produces true leadership said,  “Politicians think about the next election but leaders think about the next generation. We must begin to think beyond our political parties to providing service to our people. What unites us as a nation is more than the political parties that divide us”.

He admonished the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to jettison the idea of deregistering political parties who do not win elective seats, noting that political parties do not exist for the purpose of elections but also for the ventilation of political ideologies.