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Atiku and his promise on restructuring

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Atiku and his promise on restructuring

By John Chukwu…

Making promises of what one intends to do if elected into an office is a ritual politicians, universally, do perform. The promises, which are normally made during electioneering campaigns, are chiefly meant to position a candidate vying for an office as the right person to serve the people. Nigerian politicians are known to make campaign promises based on the very important needs of the masses in order to give them credible reasons why they deserve to be voted into office.

The Nigerian political space, lately, has been enveloped with the issue of restructuring. This issue has generated intense discussion and debate especially among the political class. It is widely believed that Nigeria needs to be restructured. This is in a bid to get the country on the right footing – since it appears to be lagging behind in its present structure of governance. Former Vice-President and presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, is one strong crusader of restructuring – and is championing the cause with all his might.

While campaigning, recently, at the South-west zonal rally of the PDP held in Ibadan, the Oyo state capital, Atiku asserted “let me tell you one of the most important policies I have advocated for in this country is restructuring. Today, I stand before you to pledge that within six months, we shall start the process of restructuring this country”.

According to Atiku, restructuring entails devolving powers to the state of geographical zones so that they can assume greater responsibility of their respective states or zones. Thus, having a small federal government which will deal essentially with matters like defence, foreign affairs, immigration and central bank.

This implies that if states/federating units are given more powers and resources to develop their respective states, then, people will have to hold their states responsible not the federal government peradventure they fail. More so, states will have the needed power to manage the resources in their area for their all-round benefit – this would, to a great extent, make states to work effectively and efficiently in developing and maximising the untapped natural resources in their area. Agriculture used to be the economic mainstay of Nigeria, prior to the oil boom in the 1970s. As it stands now, over-dependence on oil has made Nigeria to neglect the potential and dividends inherent in the agricultural sector.

However, it is pertinent to acknowledge that restructuring is a constitutional exercise which is within the sphere of the authority of legislators in the country. Therefore, for Atiku to fulfil his promise of beginning the process of restructuring, Nigeria within six months of coming to power, if he wins the presidential race in 2019, he would, definitely, need the unalloyed support of the legislators for it to come to fruition. Nigeria is ripe for restructuring as it would help correct the varied distortions in our federalism. I believe this is one of the strategic and major moves that Atiku intends to make in his dream of making Nigeria work again, if elected as a president come 2019.

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The Buhari led administration had restructuring as one of their campaign manifestos while campaigning during the 2015 presidential election. It states; “to initiate action to amend the Nigerian constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties and responsibilities to state in order to entrench true federalism and the federal spirit”. More so, the Section 7 (2) of the All Progressives Congress – APC – constitution provides for restructuring, fiscal federalism and the rest. But then, the government has not been able to get the country restructured in the almost four years they have been in power. I do hope Atiku’s promise will not fall into the same pack as that of Buhari’s if he wins in 2019.

Prior to the 2015 presidential election, Buhari was positioned as a messiah who has come to rescue Nigeria from the clutches of corruption, insecurity, power failure, administrative ineptitude, unemployment, infrastructural decay, poverty among other state ills. He swore to fight the devils, aforementioned, tormenting Nigeria to death. However, the story has remained even worst as Nigeria under his watch has witnessed incessant and unabated terrorism and violence at the unlucky hands of Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen.

The rate of insecurity has risen as evident in the World Economic Forum ranking – Nigeria is the 5th most dangerous country in the world. Unemployment still gives Nigeria the jumps. Despite the promise of the Buhari led administration to create jobs and reduce unemployment drastically, an estimated 11 million jobs have been lost under his administration. A report by the World Poverty Clock shows that Nigeria has overtaken India as the country with the most extreme poor people in the world. The report has it that 86.9 million Nigerians are now living in extreme poverty. This is almost 50% of our estimated 180 million population.

Nigerians never expected to be in this present predicament, bearing in mind the promises made to them to tackle those state ills. Thus, Atiku must not forget that the hearts of Nigerians have been battered and shattered by the unfulfilled campaign promises of politicians. Therefore, he must strive to rewrite the narrative that Nigerian politicians do not fulfil their campaign promises by keeping his words on starting the process of restructuring Nigeria, within six months, if he eventually wins the forthcoming 2019 presidential election.

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