Ben Nwabueze (SAN) in a confessional accepts guilt for the disaster that is the Nigeria constitution. He says the fundamental objective of the constitution that his group put together in 1979, which later transmogrified to the 1999 constitution, was to concentrate power at the centre. Nwabueze says he and his group, which included Rotimi Williams, were overwhelmed with patriotic feeling that the country needed unity. They reasoned that that unity could be coerced only through a strong central government.
How could Nwabueze and Williams have pursued this misguided objective? These were learned men at the very top of the legal profession, and society. Available to them was the 1963 constitution that the military had jettisoned in 1966. Available to them were reports of the pre-independence conferences. Available to them were pre-independence debates in the British parliament. Available to them were reasons proffered for adopting the three-region structure. It is a shameful dereliction that Nwabueze and co learnt nothing from these antecedent records.
During the independence debate, Colonial Secretary, Ian Macleod told the British parliament:
‘That country…is, of course, extraordinarily diverse in race, religion and in social and economic development…the political development it has chosen is that of a Federation in three regions, with each region self-governing in its own concern.’
Nwabueze and co knew also, or ought to have known, that agreement reached between British and Nigeria parties to the independence included specific mechanisms and procedures for altering the constitution; the so-called ‘entrenched clauses’.
On this Mr Macleod said:
‘On fundamental matters, however – I am sure that Nigeria is right again in this - there will be a rather more elaborate procedure for what are called the entrenched clauses. For these clauses, there will be a two-thirds majority required of all members of both Houses of the Federal Parliament and the concurrence, although by bare majority in this case, of both Houses of at least two of the regions. Thus, although change can take place, there is and there will be a considerable degree of firmness and stability and the foundations of which the independence of Nigeria is built.’
Nwabueze and Williams described themselves as patriotic Nigerians. Yet, they saddled the country with a ‘unitary’ constitution that they then deceitfully called ‘federal’; the same ‘unitary’ constitution that got Ironsi assassinated by northern soldiers. Nwabueze and Williams saddled the country with what was self-evidently, and in effect, a dictatorship. Even the colonialists knew better than to do what Nwabueze and Williams did. The outcome was predictable. The most charitable that could be said of the Nwabueze group is that they were well-meaning. Like the military masters that they were serving, Nwabueze and co had an inconsiderate, paternalistic attitude toward their fellow Nigerians.
Nwabueze apparently now has repented. He touts ‘federalism’, with its pervasive fallacy that there was a golden era when Nigeria worked. He is of the view that a revision of the current constitution to some form of ‘federalism’ would make everything ok. This is a dubious delusion, a mirage. Nigeria was a failure right from the word go. The region-federal structure never worked. Ok, perhaps briefly, during the 1954-1959 period of regional self-government.
‘Federalism’ worked then because the British were still here. They acted as broker. Their presence ensured ‘federalism’ worked. But immediately the British left on 1 October 1960, the East colluded with the North and exposed ‘federalism’ as illusory. The two regions, with jealousy and malice aforethought, targeted the destruction of the West, the region that was then the pole sitter. Nothing much has changed since 1960. East and North still hate the West. Dissolution is the only solution to Nigeria’s ills, and for the Yoruba to have their own separate independent homeland.
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