PAPER WORK BEFORE PERIODIC ELECTIONS

PAPER WORK BEFORE PERIODIC ELECTIONS
BY CHIBU NDUBUISI. 02/10/2017
Peace be upon you.
Samuel Huntington hypothesized that the test for democracy is when a country organizes two peaceful transition of power.
Nigeria has already passed his test, but why the discontent from its federating units?
If election was all that is needed for a democracy to work, why was Muslim Brotherhood toppled in Egypt? If elections were all that matters, why is there still a great deal of discontent in Nigeria regarding its constitution?
The late legal luminary Chief Rotimi Williams once said that “it is an aberration for the Nigerian constitution to proclaim “We the people”.
During the National Conference of 2014, Pastor Bosun brought to the fore a very shocking aberration in the 1999 constitution. Sharia was mentioned 73 times, Islam 28 times, Grand khadi 54 times and Muslims 10 times and Christianity was not mentioned in any section of the constitution and as a nation, that makes us to operate a “dual ideology” that negates the supremacy of the constitution itself. Hence the advocates of sharia like the Boko Haram are right in wanting to forcefully convert everyone not in their own Islamic hood as we have seen many states in Northern Nigeria, already operating the Sharia system which is another ideology within the Nigeria constitution which makes the constitution not to be supreme.
Federalism is about all units having equal footage and no part lording it over another. Federating units in Nigeria are called states, in Canada they are called provinces, in Switzerland they are called cantons in UAE they are called emirates. Why are some units in the Nigerian system having undue advantage over others? Or why are some units against restructuring or negotiating how we can run the structure of our common wealth?
“A democratic society needs two things, a way of mediating conflict and a sense of shared identity without which there is no society”. What is that shared identity in the Nigerian Constitution?
According to an African Union Communiqué of the Peace and Security Council, nine countries held constitutional referendum from January to August 2017; the countries are Algeria, Angola, Congo Brazzaville, The Gambia, Kenya, Lesotho, Rwanda, Senegal and Mauritania. Heaven did not fall neither did the nations disintegrate.
Why can’t Nigeria get its paper work(constitution) right to heal divided fault lines and fissiparous tendencies in the nation? Why are some sections resisting evolution and indirectly prompting restiveness in the polity? Is it because of oil money that is coming easily? So many countries have no oil, but they developed because they primed their development on developing the human capital. What natural resources do Singapore, Japan and Israel have?
Dare Babarinsa wrote that “ the Berlin conference that resulted in the partitioning of Africa by the European powers lasted for two years, but our leaders could not sit at Aburi in Ghana for one week to iron out their differences they rather went to war for three years”. Why can’t we sit to negotiate how we can grow as a nation?
The paper work advocated here is simply about having an encompassing constitution that is not skewed like the present 1999 constitution bequeathed to us by the military. A paper work that is truly reflective of the wishes of the federating units whether they want a return to regionalism, fiscal federalism or holding a referendum as other African countries did.
The United States of America ratified its constitution in 1788 only after that, did they organize their first presidential election.

Lets keep negotiating. The unity of Nigeria is negotiable.

Peace be with you