Stephen Ukandu, Umuahia
As the National Assembly takes the draft amendment of the constitution to geo-political zones for their inputs, former Minister for Education, and Health respectively, Professor Ihechukwu Madubuike, has advocated a return to regional government, power devolution and fiscal federalism where the federating regions will control their resources and pay agreed royalty to the Centre.
The elder statesman also demanded the creation of the long-agreed parity state for the South-East, and the drafting of a brand new constitution for Nigeria, describing the current constitution as “fraudulent, over patched and an imposition” by the military.
Professor Madubuike who also advocated a brand new constitution for Nigeria, argued that the current document which was a creation of the military, “is over patched.”
The former Commissioner for Finance in the old Imo State, contended that under regionalism, the economy of the various regions was very strong following a healthy competition among them unlike now that the virtually everything is centrally controlled.
He said: “What we elders especially those who were there when Nigeria became independent want is the kind of constitution – federal constitution – that we had, that made it possible for Nigerians not to have only one constitution, but also to have regional constitutions which is the epitome of the symbol of true federalism.
“The Eastern region then had its own constitution and a representative in the UK, and in Nigeria. That was the kind of constitution we had during independence. That made us to work and to develop along with other nations.
“Eastern region, for instance, was then developing at the same rate as Malaysia and South Korea. It was one of the fastest developing regions in Africa. We had our own constitution and we had a constitution that enabled states or the regions to develop at their own pace.
“Regrettably the military aberration changed that narrative. And since then, we have been experiencing reverse development. They centralized everything and gave humongous power to the central government.
“So, we need to devolve, reduce the powers of the federal government and cede many of them to the sub-nationals, that is the regions, the constituent states that make up the federal government.
“We have also to go back to federalism. Where states control minerals and agricultural products from their states and pay agreed royalty for the central government and military maintenance and defense.
“Again, as far as state creation is concerned, we, those of us from the South-East have suffered tremendously because of the disparities in state creation. That started with the Civil War. One of the things that provoked the Civil War was the marginalization, and the creation of states in the country when the Igbos were not there.
“I’ve been talking about that injustice. Whereas other parts of the country have six states, seven states like the North-West, the South-East has been left with only five states. In the constitutional conferences that I’ve attended, and I’ve attended two of them out of three – the Abacha Constitutional Conference, the GoodLuck Constitutional Conference – we agreed that an additional state should be created as a matter of urgency for the South-East to equalize the number of states in the country.
“In fact, we also recommended what we call parity of states in the country, which every geopolitical zone (six geopolitical zones) will have the same number of states. You know, none should have more states than the other. That’s where we are, and that’s what I think these young people who have gone again to talk about constitutional amendment should know.
“I think that the constitution has been patched enough, there’s no more space for patching it. They should come out with a completely new constitution that is federalist in all realms. We should have a new constitution. The constitution they are trying to review is first of all a fraudulent constitution, not made by the people.
“This constitution was made by the military. It’s not we the people that made it. So, it is wrong to say we the people, as the opening statement in the constitution. It’s not we. We didn’t make it. I know the constitution and I know the draft constitution we made, under Abacha Constitutional Conference.
“We handed over the draft constitution to Abacha before he died, and Gen. Abdusalami took over. He tweaked that draft constitution that we made, and departed from it.”
