Nigeria is in a state of confusion. We have nearly reached a cross roads. The ills of our country have reached unto the heavens. We have reached a point where Nigeria must decide whether or not to continue to be Nigeria, and on what basis. There are calls today, for a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) to discuss the way forward. Its protagonists have assumed that a SNC will cure everything wrong with Nigeria. Yours truly however, is of the opinion that the only permanent solution to the problems of mankind outside of God is a persistent search for one.
A SNC like all other conferences is a conference that gathers people to discuss issues affecting the people concerned and make recommendations to the solving of those problems. But who will represent who at such a parley, who will convene it, on what basis will the speakers at such a conference emerge? How will the resolutions be achieved peaceably, when will its resolutions become binding? Who will agree to its convening and why? The protagonists of this SNC should please answer these questions and the many others that space will not permit.
It is true that Nigeria was founded upon nothing ideologically. It is a fact also that Nigeria was created for administrative convenience by a certain Lord Lugard to the pleasure of His Majesty in 1914. This state called Nigeria has seen its sons and daughters killed in civil war, it has seen certain groups rise and profit themselves at the expense of the rest, and it has aided certain cliques to the attainment of power while the others have remained unrepresented. Injustice, oppression, extortion, subversion of the popular will and replacement of that with a private will and a lot more has become normal in the state called Nigeria.
Let us digress a little. A popular football team saw themselves trail to another team with an inferior reputation. A common occurrence in the beautiful game. At half time, the coach charged the players to fight with skill and determination to achieve the result worthy of their badge and colour. This coach also made adjustments to the team’s playing style (tactics). Eventually, the team with superior reputation won that match. When a good team finds itself in a bad situation, it is necessary for the coach and players to change either tactics or bring on a better attitude. The football team trailing in this match does not ask for a Sovereign Match Conference to discuss whether or not they will remain players of the team but rather, they will decide to try another approach or to work harder at the present approach.
Nigeria needs not a Sovereign National Conference but a change of approach. There is need for a new constitution as amending the present one amounts to putting old wine into new wineskins or a new patch on an old garment. Our National Assembly for all intents and purposes is already a Sovereign National Conference discussing daily matters affecting Nigeria. The problem however, is that they seem to be trifling while Nigeria burns. But we all know that a man whose house is on fire does not chase rabbits.
The greatest error to allow in this demand for a new constitution will be to assume that it is the sole duty of our overpaid and yet idle National assembly. The present 1999 constitution begins with a lie against itself: “we the people...” Such a lie cannot be made law over 150 million people. The rest of us through associations and unions and ethnic nationalities must all in part, suggest what we want and why. This need for a new constitution is a call to a buffet where each must participate however in the cooking before each can possibly take whatever each desires. Let us all cook what we will all eat.
Groups and all other forms of human assembly must go now and package such a document and present it to a Constitution Drafting Bureau which shall be responsible to receiving and making a summary of such demands to into 3 sensible drafts. This proposed Constitution Drafting Bureau shall not be a federal ministry but an office in each state to receive in soft copy each of these constitutional bits and pieces. Let everybody Ade, Idris and Okey, Akpan, Nasiru, Osagie and Dogonyaro go home and bring back his desired bit of ingredient to the cooking of this community buffet as all of us must cook and eat from it.
Bring your bit on resource control, federalism true or false, state religion or circularity, state or federal police, electoral laws, local government creation procedure, concurrent and exclusive lists, a permanent shirt in Super Eagles or federal character. Bring your bit on residential rights, immunity clause, exclusive, and concurrent lists. Bring your contribution to Nigeria just as players in that team may defend, tackle, distribute or score. None in that team will be indolent, just as none will be goalkeeper, defender, midfielder and striker at the same time. Bring your proposed part of a new Nigeria to the table. Our national assembly is too idle and gets over paid. Let us show them we can do in a few years what they have failed to do in 13 years. This is better than of asking for a Sovereign National Babel.
Yours truly before now had proposed midterm referendums for the executive arm of government. That bit will be brought just as bits to decide whether or not we should revert to the parliamentary system or create a new system altogether which might be necessary to address our peculiarity. Should we revert to driving on the right (maybe this left side is affecting our right thinking), should we have ministers from every state in the federation, should we have a federal character, should we change our flag or change our name (this one was a product of some romantic mood), let us all go home and think. This method is great because when collate all our demands in one place, there will not be Sovereign National Conference but a Sovereign National Collation of Proposals and that will take us to the next level.
The National Assembly upon receiving drafts which must have been harmonized by the Constitution Bureau will set up a New Constitution Drafting Committee whose duty will be to review the proposals. They will with the help of the Constitution Bureau arrive at 3 alternative constitutions which will be sent to a Congress of Nigerian Assemblies (State and Federal). This Congress of Nigerian Assemblies will within a period of 9 months of televised public debates argue for or against each of the constitutions until a final two have been reached. The Congress shall debate this because it is their duty to sort and combine what should go with what and agree what final two Drafts we should have. Samples of these new drafts shall then be published online for all to download and review.
Parties, pressure groups, civil societies, labour unions, churches, mosques, newspapers, opinion shapers, etc must look at both and help the layman who forms the majority reach a resolution. These two constitutions will go up for vote by referendum. The one chosen takes effect from the next date of swearing in a new government. The New Constitution will be truthful when it says, “we the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria…” This way, we have an alternative, all involving and more extensive approach to solving our problems as a people under God today and maybe tomorrow for as has been said earlier, the only permanent solution to man’s problems is the persistent search for one.
We do not need a Sovereign National Conference as that in the opinion of this writer is an opportunity for some people to receive brown envelopes for not doing anything other than create a divorce clause and add that to this existing fraud called a constitution with all its weaknesses.
Lincoln again comes to mind for he asserts that: “any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable - a most sacred right - a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world.” It is our duty now to change Nigeria wholesale instead of asking for a Sovereign National Conference.
A SNC like all other conferences is a conference that gathers people to discuss issues affecting the people concerned and make recommendations to the solving of those problems. But who will represent who at such a parley, who will convene it, on what basis will the speakers at such a conference emerge? How will the resolutions be achieved peaceably, when will its resolutions become binding? Who will agree to its convening and why? The protagonists of this SNC should please answer these questions and the many others that space will not permit.
It is true that Nigeria was founded upon nothing ideologically. It is a fact also that Nigeria was created for administrative convenience by a certain Lord Lugard to the pleasure of His Majesty in 1914. This state called Nigeria has seen its sons and daughters killed in civil war, it has seen certain groups rise and profit themselves at the expense of the rest, and it has aided certain cliques to the attainment of power while the others have remained unrepresented. Injustice, oppression, extortion, subversion of the popular will and replacement of that with a private will and a lot more has become normal in the state called Nigeria.
Let us digress a little. A popular football team saw themselves trail to another team with an inferior reputation. A common occurrence in the beautiful game. At half time, the coach charged the players to fight with skill and determination to achieve the result worthy of their badge and colour. This coach also made adjustments to the team’s playing style (tactics). Eventually, the team with superior reputation won that match. When a good team finds itself in a bad situation, it is necessary for the coach and players to change either tactics or bring on a better attitude. The football team trailing in this match does not ask for a Sovereign Match Conference to discuss whether or not they will remain players of the team but rather, they will decide to try another approach or to work harder at the present approach.
Nigeria needs not a Sovereign National Conference but a change of approach. There is need for a new constitution as amending the present one amounts to putting old wine into new wineskins or a new patch on an old garment. Our National Assembly for all intents and purposes is already a Sovereign National Conference discussing daily matters affecting Nigeria. The problem however, is that they seem to be trifling while Nigeria burns. But we all know that a man whose house is on fire does not chase rabbits.
The greatest error to allow in this demand for a new constitution will be to assume that it is the sole duty of our overpaid and yet idle National assembly. The present 1999 constitution begins with a lie against itself: “we the people...” Such a lie cannot be made law over 150 million people. The rest of us through associations and unions and ethnic nationalities must all in part, suggest what we want and why. This need for a new constitution is a call to a buffet where each must participate however in the cooking before each can possibly take whatever each desires. Let us all cook what we will all eat.
Groups and all other forms of human assembly must go now and package such a document and present it to a Constitution Drafting Bureau which shall be responsible to receiving and making a summary of such demands to into 3 sensible drafts. This proposed Constitution Drafting Bureau shall not be a federal ministry but an office in each state to receive in soft copy each of these constitutional bits and pieces. Let everybody Ade, Idris and Okey, Akpan, Nasiru, Osagie and Dogonyaro go home and bring back his desired bit of ingredient to the cooking of this community buffet as all of us must cook and eat from it.
Bring your bit on resource control, federalism true or false, state religion or circularity, state or federal police, electoral laws, local government creation procedure, concurrent and exclusive lists, a permanent shirt in Super Eagles or federal character. Bring your bit on residential rights, immunity clause, exclusive, and concurrent lists. Bring your contribution to Nigeria just as players in that team may defend, tackle, distribute or score. None in that team will be indolent, just as none will be goalkeeper, defender, midfielder and striker at the same time. Bring your proposed part of a new Nigeria to the table. Our national assembly is too idle and gets over paid. Let us show them we can do in a few years what they have failed to do in 13 years. This is better than of asking for a Sovereign National Babel.
Yours truly before now had proposed midterm referendums for the executive arm of government. That bit will be brought just as bits to decide whether or not we should revert to the parliamentary system or create a new system altogether which might be necessary to address our peculiarity. Should we revert to driving on the right (maybe this left side is affecting our right thinking), should we have ministers from every state in the federation, should we have a federal character, should we change our flag or change our name (this one was a product of some romantic mood), let us all go home and think. This method is great because when collate all our demands in one place, there will not be Sovereign National Conference but a Sovereign National Collation of Proposals and that will take us to the next level.
The National Assembly upon receiving drafts which must have been harmonized by the Constitution Bureau will set up a New Constitution Drafting Committee whose duty will be to review the proposals. They will with the help of the Constitution Bureau arrive at 3 alternative constitutions which will be sent to a Congress of Nigerian Assemblies (State and Federal). This Congress of Nigerian Assemblies will within a period of 9 months of televised public debates argue for or against each of the constitutions until a final two have been reached. The Congress shall debate this because it is their duty to sort and combine what should go with what and agree what final two Drafts we should have. Samples of these new drafts shall then be published online for all to download and review.
Parties, pressure groups, civil societies, labour unions, churches, mosques, newspapers, opinion shapers, etc must look at both and help the layman who forms the majority reach a resolution. These two constitutions will go up for vote by referendum. The one chosen takes effect from the next date of swearing in a new government. The New Constitution will be truthful when it says, “we the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria…” This way, we have an alternative, all involving and more extensive approach to solving our problems as a people under God today and maybe tomorrow for as has been said earlier, the only permanent solution to man’s problems is the persistent search for one.
We do not need a Sovereign National Conference as that in the opinion of this writer is an opportunity for some people to receive brown envelopes for not doing anything other than create a divorce clause and add that to this existing fraud called a constitution with all its weaknesses.
Lincoln again comes to mind for he asserts that: “any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable - a most sacred right - a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world.” It is our duty now to change Nigeria wholesale instead of asking for a Sovereign National Conference.
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