Forging a Path for National Rebirth : The Imperative of a New Constitutional Framework - Dr Wole Kunuji

Recent events have shown that it is not possible for the three regions of Nigeria to work together effectively in a federation so closely knit as that provided by the present Constitution. Her Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, while greatly regretting this, considers that the Constitution will have to be redrawn to provide for greater regional autonomy and for the removal of powers of intervention by the Centre in matters which can, without detriment to other Regions, be placed entirely within regional competence.

Sir Oliver Lyttleton, UK Secretary of State for the Colonies,

House of Commons Debate, 5th series, 515,

21 May 1953, cols.2263–2264.

The recent surge in the clamour for a reconfiguration of Nigeria’s extant political arrangement has, once again, drawn critical attention to the national question. The national question cannot be suppressed, neither can it be ignored. It is a prickling issue at the very heart of the Nigerian project. It queries the propriety of our current centripetal federalism and challenges us to make apposite paradigmatic changes. It draws attention to the fact that there is something fundamentally wrong with the idea of running a multi-ethnic state like Nigeria with approaches that are essentially centralist, as is currently the case. Indeed to continue to do so, despite glaring structural anomalies, is to be deliberately blind to the Nigerian reality. The long-term survival of Nigeria as a corporate entity is inexorably tied to the country’s ability to strike a convenient balance between the competing centripetal and centrifugal tendencies in the polity. This is what the national question challenges us to do. And unless this is conscientiously and expeditiously pursued, Nigeria, as we currently know it, may deleteriously unravel in the not-too-distant future.

The National Question

What is the national question, and to what extent is it important at this critical stage of the nation’s history? In his 2016 book, “The National Question and Corruption”, eminent constitutionalist, Prof. Ben Nwabueze, writes that the national question “is concerned with how, while preserving something of their separate identities, the immense number of diverse ethnic groups comprised in the territorial area of the state created with the name Nigeria and forcibly imposed by British colonialism, can be coalesced and united into one nation and how the state so created can order the relations among the constituent groups to facilitate such coalescing…” Inherent in Nwabueze’s conceptualization of the national question, are two distinct issues that are now well settled in the literature. The first is that Nigeria, as currently structured, is made up of several ethnic nationalities that are remarkably distinct and separate in identity. The second is that these disparate ethnic formations were forcibly cobbled together and coercively brought under a single state system by British colonialists. Historians have documented how, in a bid to facilitate easy administration of their conquered territories, the colonial authorities lumped together strikingly different ethnicities that were hitherto separated by language, culture, religion, social orientation, and politics. The ethnic groups were brought together under new political arrangements that were evidently faulty and thus bound to generate inter-ethnic strife. This lumping together, facilitated by colonial conquests, continued well into the 1890s and early 1900s and culminated in the (in)famous amalgamation of the Northern and Southern territories of Nigeria in 1914.

The 1914 amalgamation of Northern and Southern Nigeria is noteworthy for two major reasons. First, the scheme of amalgamation was designed and implemented solely by the colonial authorities through Sir Frederick Lugard, the colonial Governor of Nigeria. The plan, scheme and mode of amalgamation were entirely the work of Lugard. Lugard himself confirms this in his detailed account of the amalgamation, contained in a report he filed to the colonial authorities in England after the event (see F.D Lugard, Nigeria: Report on Amalgamation of Northern and Southern Nigeria, and Administration, 1912–1919 [London: H.M.S.O, 1919] pp 1–8). Lugard made no attempt whatsoever to consult or gain the consent of the peoples and territories that formed the object of this amalgamation. The amalgamation was unilaterally conceived, unilaterally designed, and forcefully imposed on the “natives.” Indeed, “Nigeria”, the new name given to the amalgamated territories was coined by Miss Flora Shaw, a Briton who later became the wife of Sir Lugard, the colonial Governor of Nigeria. The 1914 amalgamation cobbled together more than 250 large ethnicities each of which had its own distinct identity, economic orientation, political traditions, and religious culture before the arrival of the British. The arbitrariness of the amalgamation, done without any regard for history, ethnicity, and culture, set the stage for the ethnic rivalry, strife and bigotry that have characterized inter-ethnic relations in Nigeria ever since. In a bid to ensure their individual survival, regain their autonomy, and preserve their identities and dignities, Nigeria’s many ethnic groups have, for decades, remained locked in a spirited but acrimonious struggle for power and ascendancy.

Quo Vadis? - A New Constitutional Framework

The question that arises from the foregoing is, how should Nigeria address the injustice, insensitivity, and indiscretion of the 1914 amalgamation and the structural imbalances occasioned by it? Suggestions on the appropriate approach for addressing Nigeria’s problematic statehood have been varied and wide-ranging. However, one suggestion that has become very prominent of late is the call for fragmentation, that is, a breakup of Nigeria into several republics such as what happened to the defunct USSR in the early 1990s. The problem with this approach is the potential difficulties inherent in it. Apart from the potential economic, logistical, and administrative difficulties that will most certainly attend such a process, breaking away to start afresh will undoubtedly lead to fresh struggles for power and ascendancy within the new republics. We have seen this happen in South Sudan, a country that seceded from the Republic of Sudan in 2013. Till today, South Sudan is yet to properly settle down. Neither has it been able to fully focus on the business of governance. The country’s secession from Sudan led to the emergence of new political factions and new claims to power within the new State, leading to years of ethnically driven conflict. The intense internal struggle for power among these new centres of power has completely crippled governance and plunged South Sudan into untold crisis and poverty. Nigeria is a multi-ethnic country and there is no guarantee that should the country become fragmented as is being advocated in some quarters, there would be no new struggles for power among the ethnic groups or clans that constitute any break-away State, as has happened in South Sudan. Such are the uncertainties inherent in the fragmentation option.

The most viable solution to the existential problem of Nigeria is to painstakingly and democratically work out, through a new constitutional framework, the parameters under which the several ethnicities and nationalities that constitute the Nigerian State can peacefully cohabit without sacrificing their age-long desire for significant local autonomy. This is the issue that forms the crux of the national question. The Nigerian Government has a huge role to play in facilitating the resolution of this national question. Without the cooperation of the existing federal government, evidenced by the right political will and the willingness to genuinely midwife the Nigeria of our dreams, resolution of the national question will remain a pipe-dream, and the current chaos ravaging the Nigerian State will continue unabated.

What then can the Federal Government do to facilitate the resolution of the national question and pull Nigeria back from the edge of the precipice? As things stand today, the Federal Government needs to urgently facilitate the birthing of a new constitution that will straighten out the terms of our collective existence as one indivisible State. I will briefly suggest some practical steps which the current Government may wish to pursue in order to actualize this.

First, the Government should set up a Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) made up of eminent constitutionalists drawn from all over the country. The CDC should be asked to review the reports and recommendations of all constitutional conferences ever held in our checkered history as a State. The CDC should also examine and review all our previous constitutional texts, especially the 1963 constitution which, by any yardstick, remains the most “federal” of all our constitutions till date. The above-mentioned documents contain views that have been expressed by Nigerians at various times in the past on how Nigeria’s federal system should be structured. Using these documents, the CDC should then prepare a draft constitution for Nigeria. This draft constitution should be submitted to a Constituent Assembly popularly elected for the purpose of thoroughly debating the draft constitution. Membership of the Constituent Assembly should be drawn from all the 774 local governments in Nigeria. Following the Constituent’s Assembly’s deliberation on and review of the draft constitution, a final draft adopted by the Constituent Assembly should be presented to Nigerians for ratification at a properly conducted referendum. All Nigerians of voting age should be allowed to participate in this referendum. The new constitution should then be submitted to the President of Nigeria who shall, in concert with the existing National Assembly, complete the formalities of promulgating the new constitution. The above is just an outline of the steps that should be taken to ensure that the new constitution emanates through a genuinely democratic constitution-making process. No doubt, the process outlined above has its own possible challenges. However, those challenges can be mitigated or avoided altogether through measures that I have discussed, in detail, in a forthcoming book on “Constitution Making in Federal Systems.” For now, suffice it to say that the constitution-making technique set out above represents the best way to ensure that the ensuing constitution is truly an Act of the Nigerian people.

It must be emphasized that it is not the duty of the existing National Assembly to make a new Constitution for Nigeria. Nowhere in the extant 1999 constitution, fundamentally flawed as that document is, is the National Assembly empowered to embark on the process of making a new constitution, from start to finish. Constitution-making in a multi-ethnic State is a fundamental and organic process that must be managed and owned by the people themselves in conjunction with representatives that they have specifically chosen for the sole purpose of making a constitution for them. In essence, the process that births the constitution must be genuinely and thoroughly autochthonous. Although it is true that section 9 of the 1999 constitution empowers the National Assembly to amend aspects of the constitution as the need arises, what Nigeria needs at this critical point in her history is not a piecemeal amendment of the constitution, as currently being done by the National Assembly. What is needed at a time when insecurity, civil unrest, militancy, power struggles, poverty, corruption, and other forms of social upheaval are threatening to tear the country apart, is a new constitutional framework adopted by a popularly elected Constituent Assembly, and ratified by all Nigerians of voting age at a democratically conducted referendum.

The 1999 constitution is an elitist framework foisted on Nigeria by the Military on the eve of their departure from office in 1999. It is a lifeless document that is completely detached from the reality of Nigeria. To dust-up this document and insist that it is the basis on which Nigeria must be governed is to play the ostrich despite glaring deficiencies in our current governance arrangement.

Conclusion

In the last few paragraphs, I have highlighted and discussed a major cause of the separatist and secessionist campaigns currently rocking the Nigerian State, to wit, the arbitrarily contrived amalgamation of 1914 which disregarded consultation, and paid no attention to history, culture, ethnicity, and politics. The ethnicities, kingdoms, city-states, and empires that were insensitively lumped together under the 1914 arrangement have remained locked in a convulsive battle for power and ascendancy ever since. The failure of Lugard and his colonial superiors to first engage the inhabitants of these distinct and hitherto independent territories in discussions on how they would relate with each other under the amalgamation arrangement has continued to haunt the Nigerian project. It is very likely indeed that the chaotic campaigns for separation and secession would continue until this national question is appropriately confronted and resolved.

The way out is for the current Government of Nigeria to rise up to the occasion, jettison conservatism and put in motion the process for the birthing of a truly democratic constitution that is genuinely federal in character. The new constitution must foster unity without discountenancing diversity. It must enhance togetherness without suppressing local autonomy. This, candidly, is the only way out for a multi-national State like Nigeria. The parameters for fostering unity and entrenching significant local autonomy at the same time are the issues to be discussed at the Constituent Assembly and ratified by the Nigerian people at the referendum proposed above.

Nigeria is currently at a cross-road. There is no better time to discuss the Nigerian project than now. All the indices and signs of a failing state are already staring us in the face. Our leaders must stand up to save the country from disintegrating by embarking on a genuine process of restructuring through a new constitutional framework. Only then will our children and grandchildren be able to look back several years hence and say “this, indeed, was their finest hour (Winston Churchill)”

Dr. Kunuji is a Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Lagos.