‎Senator Ayo Arise contends that history has given President Muhammadu Buhari a unique opportunity to end all agitations for secession and make Nigeria the pride of the black race
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I have read the document outlining the position of the Yoruba people and I think it is very brilliant. I rather prefer the presidential system of government with adequate rule of law and with many of the points raised during the Yoruba leaders meeting to form part of a new or amended constitution.
The major problematic area is the lack of practice of true federalism as practised in the United States of America.
Thurgood Marshall opined on the American constitution as imperfect but it remained the best the world could offer. The imperfections were noticed and for over two centuries, amendments still continue towards getting a near perfect document, on how people and government can relate together to achieve the right of individuals to pursue freedom, and happiness within the structure of a regulated society.
We distribute offices based on federal character without consideration for contribution towards the federalism hence the anger, the insults and the desire for a better and more just society. The greatest imbalance of our structure emanated during the military era of command structure when a single individual can unilaterally create a state and numerous local governments without regard to productivity or any reasonable basis for decision making, outside nepotism and raw abuse of power.
We, the people of Nigeria have now worked with the bequeathed constitution and we are fortunate enough to realize that for Nigeria to continue to function as a State, adjustments are required to prevent us from taking the route of less fortunate people of countries like Sudan, Somalia, Yugoslavia and many others. We are truly a blessed nation to realize this early enough that if we do not embrace change, change would change us for the worse.
Looking at the areas of serious contention, we need to make some hard decisions in the area of devolution of power from the centre to the states. Do we need to create new structures outside the current ones such as regional government? Methinks that the answer is ‘No’ for various reasons; the current structure is benefiting some areas of the country and they would not let go of the advantages they already have. I will rather suggest that we find a way of working with what we have and remove the impediments for growth, so that states can start to enjoy the benefits of their natural endowment and innovation.
There has been some strong position on the adjustment of the revenue sharing formula. This is the minimum the federal government can sacrifice for a United Nigeria. We have the example of America that continues to grow by acquiring more territories that have now become part of the United States. The idea of states controlling their endowed natural resources and paying taxes to the federal government has blossomed and made America the country it is today. Since examples abound, we do not need to reinvent the wheel before we know what has worked for the US where we copied our constitution from. It is an enduring formula that we need to copy.
The state and local government or city police has become an albatross on the current National Assembly. There is the fear that the states would turn such state police to agents of oppression in their respective states. There is no question that they would try but my position on such postulation is that we the people should plan for the good of society while we strengthen our laws and enforcement agencies to take care of the criminals. The long arm of the law would invariably catch up with wrong doers. Note that as recent as the last 50 years, there were sheriffs who participated in organized crime in their communities including murder of black men particularly in some southern states of the United States. Gradually and systematically, the country rose up to correct the great anomalies of the criminal minded people of that period.
We are fortunate that we are now in the era of technology where we can locate the position of law enforcement officers at any point in time using GPRS. Today in America, once a policeman stops you, it becomes mandatory for such officer to activate the video camera that captures every conversation and action. Those who do not comply are quickly shown the door out. Today in Nigeria, most telephones now carry a camera. We can train our people to utilize such devises to promote law and order in our country. These video cameras would be used to capture erring local police officers who would certainly face prosecution in the face of such evidence.
The federal police would still have superior authority in matters relating to federal offences. Things like wire fraud, internet fraud, murder where the criminal has crossed state borders to another jurisdiction, racial discrimination of any kind including the likes of IPOB and those giving notice of evacuation to a particular tribe, postal fraud, custom and immigration fraud etc. all fall under federal crime. Murder is however a state crime in America and penalty ranges from imprisonment to capital punishment depending on the state. California gives maximum punishment of life imprisonment.
Local government creation is another area of discontent between the north and the south. Whereas Kano state that had equal numbers of local government prior to Abacha’s regime with Lagos State, now has over 60 including the over twenty created in Jigawa when the latter was created out of Kano State. Lagos still remains 20. This is one of the greatest problems created for the people of Nigeria by the junta of yesteryears. My take is that local government list should be removed from our constitution and the restructuring should allow states to create their local government based on viability and ability of the states to support large numbers of local governments. The new amendment should only recognize two tiers of government. These should be the federal and the states. Taxes from LGAs should be paid to the states and the states thereafter share in whatever percentages agreed upon with the federal and local government.
Regional government is not a panacea for good governance. I see it as another bottleneck between the governors and the governed. We are all now very suspicious of the federal government, why should we create another layer of public waste to line a different kind of pocket? The regional government of old had a premier but now imagine several states having governors under a premier and under a president. As good as it sounds on paper; sooner or later there would be another row of agitation within the regions.
It is certain that this will be a difficult sell. Part of the fear is for the future where the regions could become another front for embezzlement and tyranny of the states.
My suggestion is that we should strive towards devolution of power and a restructured federal government.
The National Assembly as currently constituted will continue to attract criticism based on the quantum of money spent to maintain our legislators. It is pertinent to note that the United States has 50 states and 100 senators. Nigeria with 36 States already has 109 senators. We should quickly prune down the number of senators to 2 per state taking cognizance of possibility to create more states in the future. The senatorial election in each state should be statewide. This is one of the reasons why a senator in the US tends to be more recognized than the governors and why governors next logical move in America is either the Senate or the Presidency. .
Those who wrote the 1979 and 1999 constitution missed a very vital reason as to why election to the US congress is every two years whereas that of the president is every 4 years. The first session of the Senate of the United States in 1789 divided themselves into three groups. By ballot some went for election after two years, some after 4 years and the last after 6 years. This ensured that at every election there are 66% of the senators as incumbent to carry on the business of law making by passing their experience to the newly elected legislators. This is a very great accomplishment of people who could anticipate the future. Should we now wait till we are faced with a situation where all our senators are voted out and replaced by an accidental electoral tsunami before we do what is right? I pushed for this during the constitutional amendments of 2010 during the committee debates. Though the Deputy Senate President agreed with me in principle but who was willing to sacrifice his 4 years for 2 years? For the records, I was willing to do that so that my other colleagues from Ekiti could take 4 and 6 years respectively. (I have no doubt in my mind that if the discussion had made it to the Senate floor, there would be other people who could have volunteered to take 2 years and go for election for another 6 years).Our greatest challenge was how to get such amendment to pass the House of Representatives when the American system recommends 2 years tenure for their House of Representative members. This is now in the public arena and we should not make the mistake that we are insulated against such occurrence. Issues like this can be put to vote during general elections until our people are sufficiently educated to vote correctly. Election of the congress should be every two years, with a six years tenure for the Senate and a two years tenure for the Representative members. This would guarantee staggered election so that once some members are leaving, there would still be some experienced members left to welcome the new comers.
Let us push for a federal system of government that completely copies the US system with emphasis on respect for the rule of law that all men are created equal.
The position of the Senate President should be abolished and replaced by the Vice President to ensure that manifestos of the ruling party can be mostly achieved in the event of a voting tie.
History beckons on President Muhhammadu Buhari who God brought at this trying moment of our national history to be the father of our nation and not a president that comes from the north of Nigeria. Some of us know that Texas was a Republic until it agreed to join the United States in 1845. States of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah were all part of Mexico with Spanish people. The New England States were inhabited by people from England and Ireland. The Italians and Germans dominated New York and Pennsylvania. Today, we only know about Americans. Despite the fact that Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison all came from the northern part of America, it did not stop them from granting freedom to control resources by states where such came from. This helped to build the trust that made a republic step down from a country status to become a state in America. The impetus is the sense of fairness, equity and justice that galvanized the prosperity that America enjoys today. This is all that Nigerians ask of this government. Let us impress it on members of the National Assembly that we are in a dire state that requires seeing beyond our noses when called to action in resolving the looming danger facing our nation today.
Every great leader had made some difficult decision to affect the course of history of nations and mankind. President Muhammadu Buhari, this is your time and moment in history to end all agitation for secession and make this nation the greatest pride for the black race.
