Adegbuyi: Nigeria Urgently Needs a New Constitution

Lawyer-turned politician and Deputy Director General of the Governor Ibikunle Amosun Campaign Organisation, Chief Bisi Adegbuyi, spoke to Shola Oyeyipo on the need for the Muhammadu Buhari administration to pick some of the useful resolutions from previou

Are there lessons from the 2015 elections? For me, the lessons are many but chief among the lessons is for those who hold power to ensure that the wishes and aspirations of the people are always factored into whatsoever they’re doing. The essence of democracy is to achieve the greatest good to the best number and therefore, people who are in the position of authority should always have the interest of the governed at heart.

There must not be a disconnect; there was a major disconnect between the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)-controlled government and the people and when the opportunity came for the people to exercise their franchise, which was referendum on the performance, they voted against the incumbent president.

Naturally, there is always a very strong anti-incumbent sentiment among the people, especially when their expectations are not met. Therefore, the essence of democracy is to do what the people want to renew your mandate. If you go against their wishes, of course, they will vote you out. What does the re-election of Governor Ibikunle Amosun portend for the state? Clearly, there will be continuity of good governance with the mandate of Governor Ibikunle Amosun, having been renewed. It is a vote of confidence on his performance in office and there is a responsibility to that – people would expect you to do more; to bear at the back of your mind. The conversation you had with the people.

We went through the nooks and crannies of the state; 20 local government areas and 236 wards; we interacted with a broad spectrum of the society; all the critical stakeholders we met and at every point, they set agenda for Governor Ibikunle Amosun. Therefore, his job is clear cut for him, Having regard for his experience in office, one will expect him to hit the ground running. Governor Amosun has risen up to the occasion by signing the all-important light rail system that would ease transportation tremendously in the state.

Again, I would expect the governor to expand the frontier of his governance by embarking on massive rural delivery. He has scored an A in areas of urban renewal. Cities in Ogun State are wearing new looks and road networks are sights to behold. Therefore, governance should now be re-directed towards the people in the rural areas and I’m very sure Governor Amosun will rise up to the occasion. At the national level, Nigerians are really looking forward to the APC-led government to make the change mantra a reality. In your views, what are the critical things that government should do to create presence? If you conduct an opinion poll in Nigeria today, the greater percentage of our people would want the endemic corruption in our society to be frontally tackled. And clearly, the people voted for General Muhammadu Buhari because of his anti-corruption stance; because of the mantra of change. What that change means is a new direction in government. It should be a government that should focus on how to block all leakages that are in the way of development in Nigeria.

For General Buhari to run a government that would embark on massive provisions of infrastructure and live up to the expectations, he must block the loopholes so that funds can be available for real governance. He would have to look at the various laws that set up parastatals in Nigeria. I’m concerned that the law setting up parastatals in Nigeria allows them to deduct from source whatever they decide their recurrent expenditure is before remitting whatever is outstanding to the federation account. That is clearly anti-development.

In my view, parastatals should not be allowed to deduct from source, whatever their recurrent expenditure are before remitting whatever is outstanding to the federation account. That is why funds are not just available for purposes of development. General Buhari should look critically into that and get the laws amended.

Impunity in Nigeria has reached alarming height such that lawlessness has become the order of the day. We cannot continue to run a country as if there are no laws – as if it’s a banana Island. Countries that are governed like that hardly make progress. The institutions must be strengthened.

Insecurity is of course a source of worry for members of the society and in tackling that, we must adopt the carrot and stick strategy. The unemployment that is ravaging Nigeria is clearly a source of insecurity. When people are jobless they necessarily would want to find a way of making ends meet. We need to provide jobs for our youths.

And the stick approach is that we have to enforce our laws. I don’t see how we can run away from decentralisation of the police system in Nigeria if we are serious about fighting insecurity. Policing is a local matter all over the world. The locals are supposed to be entrusted with the responsibility of policing. A country that is multi-ethnic, multi-religious and plural in nature must have a constitution that takes cognizance of the plurality. Therefore, a federal constitution is a way out. How feasible is a federal constitution when nothing was made of the recent constitutional conference, more so that the APC did not buy into it? In other words, Buhari is not likely to adopt the provisions, whereas the National Assembly’s constitutional amendment is already causing feud between the government and the lawmakers. How then do you think the nation can come by a federal constitution? Your question is loaded and I will try to answer it in no particular other. First and foremost, I think it is clear to all and sundry that Nigeria urgently requires a new constitution. There is no question about it! By the virtue of the Supreme Court ruling stopping the ongoing constitutional amendment – it has ruled that they maintain the status quo. To me, it has reached a dead end and our position has been vindicated that it was an exercise in futility to continue to amend the 1999 constitution.

It is not a constitution that emanated from the people. It is lacking in legitimacy because the peoples consent have not been sought to legitimise it. This also affords me the opportunity of putting the position of my party, the APC and the issue of national conference in proper perspective.

I do not agree that the APC is in any way opposed to the constitutional conference. My party’s position when President Goodluck Jonathan announced his intention to convoke a national conference was very clear that the timing was wrong. That is was a Greek gift by reason of the fact that my party; rightly in my view, saw it as an attempt to shore up the popularity of the president, who was looking for a straw to hold on because he knew he would be defeated at the polls.

And believing that his convocation of the national conference would sway peoples’ opinion in his favour, he went ahead with it. With the benefit of hindsight, I think people who were opposed to it for reasons aforementioned have been justified. Then we found ourselves in a dilemma of some sorts; whether to totally boycott the national conference or not.

I can make this public; I persuaded Governor Amosun to enter discussion with the leadership of the APC that we should not boycott the conference because it will be in line with the advice of my late hero, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, to the effect that it is unproductive to boycott whatever the government of the day plans to do, because if you do, some others who don’t even have the interest of the people at heart would embrace it and take decisions that will be binding on us and if we believe nothing good will come out of it and if it turns out to be something good, what do we do?

I think that advice weighed heavily on the mind of Governor Amosun and that in my view led all the APC state governments into nominating delegates to that national conference. I do not think that it is right to say the APC boycotted the national conference. What we did was a symbolic boycott by refusing to nominate two delegates slots that were given to the party.

Would it be right to say the APC boycotted the national conference when in fact two or three states presented memoranda to the conference? I’m aware Osun, Lagos and in a way, Ogun States also did. Their position basically was how to engender federalism in Nigeria and then the critical issue of devolution of power – enough of constitutional conferences.

I do not think it is going to serve any purpose to convoke another conference because we have had enough conferences. The reports of the various conferences should be looked at particularly the President Goodluck Jonathan convoked conference. I submit without any spirit of immodesty that about 600 recommendations of the national conference are game changers.

They are profound and therein lay the solution to the problems bedeviling the Nigerian state. The utilitarian value of that national conference should also be remembered. Critical stakeholders in the country – for the first time, affixed their signatures to a document agreeing on fundamentals of how to re-engineer Nigeria. That to me is not a mere achievement.

We should not see the recommendations and resolutions of the national conference as that of Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. Nigerian money was spent on it. Whatever resolutions that we have in place belong to the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) and I believe that we will not be doing ourselves any good if we choose to ignore the outcome of the national conference. So are you suggesting that the incoming president should consider those resolutions? Clearly! We have to say it now loud and clear that corruption is not the only problem bedeviling the Nigerian state. There is the issue of that national question. Our fault lines are still there. The results of the just concluded elections are there for people to see. People voted along ethnic and religious lines.