It’s all in the ‘law’ - Constitutional Review Palaver

Interminable debates and consultations about constitutional reform have marked the Nigerian journey towards democracy, typified by the never ending calls and attempts to review the current constitution, the 1999 Constitution. From inception, the legitimacy of this Constitution has been in question first because the military unilaterally promulgated it just before the civilian administration took over in May 1999 and second because Nigerians were not consulted on it.

Since then, according to the Constitutional Reform Dialogue Mechanism ‘civil society organisations, professional groups, religious bodies, organised labour, private sector and all segments of the Nigerian society have engaged with the constitutional review process. They have organised meetings, workshops, seminars, conferences and produced position papers, model constitutions and memoranda at different times.’ None of which have been adopted.

A few weeks ago, for the umpteenth time, the National Assembly inaugurated an 88-member Joint Committee on Constitution Review (JCCR) under the chairmanship of the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremad. Immediately the clamour of special interest groups, which had been building up slowly, exploded. As usual the attention seems to be focused on the same issues, to mention a few: the creation of states (people want even more states to aid underdevelopment and enrich a few), derivation formula & revenue allocation (because the Niger Delta is benefiting so well from what they have been allocated so far) and election reform (though why we need this is hard to understand, especially since Maurice Iwu advised the United States to learn from our electoral process).

However, it looks like we are beginning to learn from the past. The members of the new JCCR have been inundated with advice to ensure they do not repeat the mistakes of the past. To avoid the pitfalls of past review committees the JCCR should have a project plan to govern the process; include the public in consultations; prioritise the issues - not have a long list of amendments such as the last report which had 120 amendments; and stay away from contentious issues such as the immunity clause and ‘third term’ which scuttled the last attempt to amend the Constitution.

But from all indications it might be impossible to stay away from the contentious issues. All of the major recurrent issues which come up when constitutional review is discussed are contentious: state police? Some want theirs – with good reason if the condition of security and the antics of the police are anything to go by. But would this not give Governors the right to their own private army with which to intimidate and plunder? State creation? Every ethnic minority (read hamlet) wants to be its own state and while we get worked up about oppression of ethnic minorities if we have 250 ethnic groups in Nigeria are we headed for 250 states?

Some of the more interesting suggestions for the JCCR to focus on include campaign finance, a review of the exclusive and concurrent legislative lists and federalism in general.

The Exclusive List in the 1999 constitution provides the governance issues which only the National Assembly can make laws for e.g., national security and the military. The Concurrent List is made up of things which both the National Assembly and the State Legislature can make law on and sometimes this causes confusion. For instance, in Item 22 of the Exclusive List the Federal Government through the National Assembly can make laws for the “election to the offices of President and Vice-President or Governor and Deputy Governor and any other office to which a person may be elected under this Constitution, excluding election to a local government council or any office in such council. However Item 11 of the Concurrent List provides that ‘the National Assembly may make laws for the Federation with respect to the registration of voters and the procedure regulating elections to a local government council. What is the position and more importantly why would the National Assembly want to make laws for local governments when it is more practical for States which know the idiosyncrasies of their local governments? Maybe this interference is the reason why we have violent local government elections.

As for Federal Character – this is not only enshrined in the Constitution, but Section 147 on ministers specifically instructs that we must have at least one minister from each state. This must be the reason why although we only have twenty eight ministries, we have forty two ministers complete with all the costs which come with that. This must be why it took the President nearly six months to change his cabinet. Is ‘state representation’ really more important than the collective progress of Nigeria? What will happen to this untenable and expensive provision if people have their way and we have 250 states in Nigeria?

Let’s forget about extra States for a change and focus on election and campaign finance and set limits to the contributions individuals or corporations can make to political parties. Let’s find out who the 88 members to the JCCR are and share our views on what the issues are with them – let’s pretend we voted for them and that we can make them listen to us.



1999 Constitution Review Milestones

- Presidential Committee established Oct 19 1999
- Presidential Committee submits report Feb 2001
- National Assembly Review Committee inaugurated May 2000
- National Assembly Review Committee’s term expires May 2003
- National Assembly Review Committee reconstituted Oct 30 2003
- Senate rejects recommendations of Committee May 16 2006
(including ‘3rd term’)
- JCCR inaugurated Nov 20 2008


Published December 9 2008