The Only State Worth Creating is…

Kayode Komolafe

Although the argument against the creation of more states is a solid one, it is only fair to create just one state in the southeast.

It is, of course, true that the proposal for the creation of just one state, which should be in the southeast of Nigeria, cannot be made in a political vacuum. The proposal must be framed within the context of the strong and legitimate advocacy for a   pause on state creation. 

For clarity, the merit in the no-more state creation position is too obvious to be denied in the present circumstance of the political economy The viability of some of the existing 36 states has been brought into question in many informed quarters. Only a handful of states could depend on only their internally generated revenues to   run credible administrations. For instance, the current solvency in the states has been unarguably traced to increased allocations from the federation account. This trend is a net effect of one of the signature policies of President Bola Tinubu – the   stoppage of fuel subsidies.

Besides, at a time of public outcry against unsustainable cost of governance, state creation may not be a logical thing to do for indisputable reasons. When a state is carved out of an existing one, the cost of governance is automatically replicated with a new set of elected and appointed officials along with an-other bureaucracy.

In fact, during the debate on the future of the Nigerian brand of federalism, the argument has also been made that instead of state creation there should be mergers of some of the existing states. 

Now, the federalist cause is served better with strong and viable federating states leveraging their size and other implicit strengths in interacting with the centre. On the contrary, the atomisation of states could weaken them inadvertently as federating units. The bigger the number of the federating units, the weaker they become relative to the centre. Continuous negotiation is the soul of federalism. So larg-er federating units are more likely to be more effective negotiators.  

This debate has lasted for decades. In the view of proponents of merger of states, the outcome of the exercise could range from six to 15 regions. The restructuring debate has indeed yielded a harvest of ideas. For instance, more than 30 years ago, a notable nationalist, Chief Anthony Enahoro, came up with a formula of geo-political engineering in which 36 states would be restructured into 14 regions. Enahoro’s position is in some respects coterminous with that of Edwin Madunagu, a Marxist, who in a series of writings has advocated a “popular democratic restructuring.” The proposed structure would have the following tiers of government: federal, zonal, state, local government area and   communities. Madunagu puts it as follows: “Nigeria will remain a federal republic; the current principles of citizenship, fundamental human rights and principles of state policy will be enhanced; the federal government will give up a substantial fraction of its current appropriation to the states and local governments. The states, in turn, will finance the zones and the local governments will finance the communities. Finally—and this is the “magic” of popular democracy—the ‘cost of governance’, both in relative and absolute terms, will be much less than what it is at present.”

The formulae of both Enahoro and Madunagu are samples of the ideas generated in the restructuring debate.

Since 1999, the subject of state creation has been a feature of constitution review efforts. The topic also surfaces episodically during the electoral seasons. 

The pitch of the debate has varied from one period to the other since the colonial days. Meanwhile, various administrations have embarked on tweaking the structure of the Nigerian federation since the creation of the Mid -Western Region out of the old Western Region in 1963. That has been the only state creation done  as a constitutional exercise. A referendum was conducted and the region was created in a parliamentary process. By that act, Nigeria became a federation of four regions namely the northern region, western region, eastern region and mid-western region.

Subsequent exercises of state creation were by means of military decrees.

At the onset of the tragic civil war in 1967, General Yakubu Gowon redrew the geo-political map of Ni-geria by creating 12 states – six in the north and six in the south. The six states carved from the old northern region were the North-Western State, North-Eastern State, North -Central State, Kano State, Benue-Plateau State and Kwara State. From the old western region Western State and Lagos States emerged while three states were carved from the eastern region-East-Central State, South-Eastern State and Rivers State. The Mid-Western region became Mid-Western State.

Further splitting of states happened in 1976 when General Murtala Mohammed created seven more states, thereby redrawing the map of Nigeria into a 19-state structure. The old North-Western State was split into Sokoto and Niger States.  The North -Central State became Kaduna State. From the old North-Eastern State emerged Borno State, Bauchi State and Gongola State.  Out of the old Western State, Oyo, Ogun and Ondo States were carved while Imo and Anambra came out of the East-Central State. The old South-Eastern State was renamed Cross River State while Rivers State retained its name.

General Ibrahim Babangida created states twice during his eight years in power. The first time was in 1987 when Akwa Ibom was carved out of old Cross Rivers State and Katsina was created out of the old Kaduna State. This turned the federation into a 21-state structure.

The second state creation by Babangida was in in 1991 when nine states were created. They are Abia created from the old Imo State; Enugu from the old Anambra; Jigawa from the old Kano State; Kebbi from the old Sokoto State; Osun from the old Oyo State and Kogi from the old Kwara State. Gongola State was split into Adamawa and Taraba States while Edo and States were created from Bendel State. So, the Babangida regime left behind a 30 -state structure in 1993

The last state creation exercise was carried by General Sani Abacha with the creation of six additional in 1996. The states are Bayelsa, created from the old Rivers State; Ebonyi from old Enugu State and Abia State; Ekiti from the old Ondo State; Gombe from the old Bauchi State; Nasarawa from the Plateau State and Zamfara from the old Sokoto State.

Since 1996, the only semblance of structural tweaking of the federation has been the idea of zones-northwest, north-central; northeast, southwest, southeast and south-south. Former Vice President Alex Ekwueme proposed it at the constitutional conference convened by Abacha in 1995. Even though this geo-political categorisation has not been constitutionalised, it has become conventional when geo-political considerations come into play. Zoning is now part of the political language of Nigeria.

One indubitable fact that has emerged from the foregoing acts of restructuring by other means is that the Nigerian state has been unfair to the southeast zone. With all the splitting of states and renaming of some, southeast is the only zone with five states. Four of the zones – southwest, south-south, north-central, and northeast- have each six states. The northwest even has seven states in the 36-state struc-ture. In the interest of geo-political equity, it is important to create one more state.  That one state should be in the southeast of Nigeria.  It would promote national integration.

This should be done despite the weighty argument against state creation. Redrawing the map of the southeast should be done with the input of the socio-political leadership of the zone.

The only state that is worth creating is the one that should make the southeast have six states like other zones in the south.