At Retreat on Constitution Review, Senators Divided over Agitation for Return to Regionalism

*Regional government outdated, say senators Ndume, Ningi, Musa, Dandutse

*It will boost economy, security, development, Oyo senator, Buhari insists  

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

Some southern and northern senators yesterday disagreed over the agitation for the return of Nigeria to the regional form of government.
They expressed their divergent views at the sidelines of the ongoing two-day retreat on the amendments to the 1999 Constitution organised by the Senate Committee on Constitution Review in collaboration with the Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre (PLAC) in Kano.

While some senators from the northern part of the country who spoke on the issue vehemently opposed regional form of government, their colleague from South-west described it as a welcome development that would improve the economy, tackle insecurity and fast-track infrastructural development.
Nigeria had practised a more regional form of government between 1954 and 1966, in the Western, Eastern, and Northern regions. The Mid-Western region was later carved out of the Western Region in 1963.

The model lasted until 1966 when the military overthrew the civilian government.
Speaking to journalists on the issue at the retreat, a ranking Senator from Bauchi Central Senatorial District, Abdul Ningi, said his people would never support the model because they did not enjoy any form of development when the system of government was practised in the defunct First Republic.
Ningi said: “I have heard so much about regional government or federalism and I have heard people going about, canvassing for such ideas.
“For a start, no matter how you see it, the current document (1999 Constitution) is still the ground norm. It has also stipulated how it is going to be amended.

“Having said that, it is also imperative to also know that it isn’t just enough for anybody to come and say he is the representative of one ethnic group or another at the National Assembly.
“The question that arises is, when was this mandate canvassed? When was it received? You are a representative of a particular ethnic group in Nigeria, at what time were you given the mandate to canvass that?
“The only people that are given this mandate, to look at the Constitution and amend it are, of course, members of the National Assembly.

“Therefore, it is important for those who go about selling these ideas, false ideas in my opinion, that they are representatives of the people to let Nigerians know where they are coming from and in whose mandate and when was this mandate given to them.
“We have seen how the regional government was operated in the past. My part of the country that I am representing didn’t enjoy the development of that so-called regional government that was based in Kaduna.

“We aren’t going back there again! I am speaking for my senatorial district. It is either the Nigerian federation or nothing. We can’t go along; my senatorial district will be satisfied independently with Nigeria if that is what is required.
“As far as regional government is concerned, my constituency, my people aren’t for it. What we need is the reform of the current federal government structure and fiscal federalism because there is nothing like true federalism,” he added.

“I have visited India, Argentina, Singapore, and the United States, all in trying to understand federalism. Federalism is done according to the history of each particular country. But what is important about our federalism is serious reforms but the bottom line is not what you see on paper that is important. It is the practitioners and the implementers, otherwise, the Constitution has been able to sustain us over 25 years. That means that there is something germane and important about it. What it needs is that at every given time you look at it in particular, the devolution of power is so much more important, from the state to the local government level. There is no clear distinction of power between the state and the local government but there is distinctive separation of power between the Federation and the sub-nationals,” Ningi explained.

Also, the Chairman Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFund, Senator Muntari Dandutse, representing Katsina South Senatorial District, also disagreed with the proponents of regional government.
He said the essence of the ongoing retreat was to improve on the defects and anomalies discovered in the nation’s constitution over the years.
He said: “We should not have myopic thinking about ourselves. No section of this country is not blessed.
“What is important is that we should have good governance, credible and responsible accessibility of the resources that we have because Nigeria is blessed.

“We have all the comparative advantages that will move this country forward unless of course, we are not serious and determined,” he said.
Similarly, a former Senate Leader, Senator Ali Ndume, said the idea of true federalism was no longer fashionable because many countries in Africa had discarded it.
He advocated the creation of strong institutions that would enhance good governance and curb corruption and insecurity.
“When the government put these in place, there won’t be clamour for true federalism because there will be justice, equity and fairness in all the regions of the country,” he said.

On his part, the Chairman, the Senate Committee on Finance, Senator Sani Musa, also challenged the proponents of regional government to send the bills to the National Assembly and test its popularity.
Musa advised Nigerians not to confuse the establishment of the Zonal Development Commission with regionalism.
He said the various geopolitical zonal development commission was strictly for the social and economic development of their areas.
He said: “It is wrong of anybody to think that the development commissions being established for the six geopolitical zones is a plan towards regionalism. It is not.

“Those who are advocating for it should come up with bills through their representatives in the National Assembly and test the popularity of their proposal.”
However, the Senator representing Oyo North Senatorial District, Senator Abdulfatai Buhari, disagreed with those condemning the regional system of government.
Buhari said: “Recall that the regions were able to harness their resources in the First Republic.
“We were able to harness all our resources. There was no dominance of a particular resource(s).
“In those years, the North was known for the pyramid of groundnuts, the South-west was known for cocoa, we should be able to do that.

“When you make the centre less attractive, you cut off corruption. You can’t wipe it off, but you can cut it off because there is what is called, ‘watch your team’. People will watch their team within their locality or their region.
Asked whether the South-west region has a specific agenda for the ongoing constitution review, he said such a position would be presented at the appropriate time.

He said: “We don’t want to disclose that agenda yet but we have agreed among ourselves that the person that is going to present that is the Chairman of the South-west Forum when the time comes. It will be very unfair for me now as a member to start discussing that.”
However, the Leader of the Senate, Senator Opeyemi Bamidele, advised that no legislative action should be encouraged on the issue of regionalism so that it does not become an exercise in futility.

He added that if the issue of regionalism must come up, the political stakeholders, the civil society, as well as other stakeholders in the country, would have to debate on it and come to a conclusion.
He said: “There are some decisions in the state of which an executive bill cannot come to the parliament unless there are some political consensuses.
“For me, going back to a regional form of governance is something that will go beyond a bill being sponsored, either as a parliament member bill or as an executive bill.

“It’s also not something that you sit down in a public hearing room and organise a public hearing to decide on.
“An example is when people tell us, oh, you know, you are in parliament. As a parliament, you cannot discard the entire constitution. Nigeria needs a new constitution because this constitution cannot work.

“It’s easy for people to make such arguments, but that is not something we can sit down in parliament and do.
“So, we are not changing the constitution, because that would require a political consensus, and that would also require the buy-in of the Nigerian people themselves.

“I mean, why is it so difficult to amend even one section of the constitution, not even talk of discarding the entire constitution?
“So, to amend a single provision in the constitution today, the National Assembly, all chambers, will have to go through this entire process we are going through, which we go through in every legislative assembly, and many of you have been a part of this process.”