 The immediate past president-general of Wuhan is Indigbo chief Nian Mordo has warned that Nigeria might run into a constitutional crisis if it fails to restructure before the 2023 general election, as some sections of the country might boycott the polls as a result of the growing dissatisfaction in the land. The former minister for information insisted that Nigeria must restructure to give its component units sovereignty over its natural resources, provided they pay some form of taxation to the federal government to maintain federal responsibilities. He also noted that domestic security must remain in the hands of the federating units. The former aviation minister warned that Nigeria's disintegration was not likely or unlikely if the conditions given were not met. Joining us to discuss this is Dr Soni Maduka and Dak Bada Mola, both are political analysts. Thank you very much gentlemen for joining us. Maduka and Ms R. Thank you. All right, if you can hear me I'm going to start with Dr Maduka. We always hear about the issue of restructuring, you know, every time it's pre-election season. And so it makes me really curious is the restructuring slogan or the restructuring conversation now a political tool, a way to get votes, or is it really a conversation worth having? Dr Maduka, can you hear me? All right, let's try our other guest. Can you hear me gentlemen? I can hear you now. Okay, go ahead. You want me to speak? Yes. Okay, what we're having in this country is we started on a wrong footing. If you look at the instrument of this country's evolution, you discover that there was a document signed and sealed. Sorry, do you have your television on? You need to turn off your television or turn off the volume because we can hear feedback. No, okay, okay, it's off, it's off, okay, so what I've said, the instrument of our independence, there was an instrument, there was a document, and that document was signed and it gave rise to three regions before its non-metaphoric origin. So that was the basis of our existence. Although the war came and messed up the whole thing, but the ministry has no right to start niving off like Goan did and created 12 states just on a fierce issue. And the other ministry, John had started creating states, there was no impute from the civilians. So what we saw was just impunity by the ministry, and there's no way you can start like that. Now coming to the basis of this discussion, APC manifesto was clear. In 2024, their number one manifesto was that they're going to re-structure this country. And it was even based on that that Nigerians took out and voted them in. And unfortunately, they created or they formed a committee headed by Erufa. Erufa did a work and presented to the president, as at now that report is lying fallow. And of course, as gullible as we are, when they came in 2019, they say, ah, in this second next level, they're going to make it no. But unfortunately, we have just one year plus. That means that that report will not see the light of the day. The problem we have is just as stated by the former minister. If we don't do something right now, it's going to be very hard. For once in my lifetime, Sokoto, that is a caliphate of Muslims where you can never see anything talked about, anything called violence, is now being almost run over by bandits. That is to tell you there's a problem, except we are just trying to lie to ourselves. There's a serious foundation, foundational problem. Look at it from this way. Our constitution, the first paragraph say, we Nigeria, nobody, and that constitution was given to us at the day of inauguration. It was not debated. Nobody knew the content of that constitution and today we are seeing the problem. The problem is that if a minister, if a governor built a road for you, you go and drum and play and dance because he won't do him anything if he didn't build anything for you. So if the president is coming to commission something for you, which is our money, our commonwealth, Nigerians line up to drum as if something is wrong with us. What are you drumming? This is what they are supposed to do. So I think the problem we have is that that constitution has a very fundamental problem and until we bring it down, we will not be able to move forward. And of course that constitution is going to consume us all soon. Look at it in the creation of states. Look at it before. We have four regions and of four regions we are equal and matched. Today, when you talk about divisions now, we have three. The west, the east and the north. The north alone has more than enough to deal with even the south and the west combined together. On what basis? Who negotiated that kind of format? Who negotiated that idea of fighting and one of that? The whole thing is not right and I think we need to do something about it. And the earlier, the better. Otherwise, I'm telling you, we will wake up one day and this country will not be there. Well I don't think we won that but let me go to our next guest. It's interesting where the doctor left off. He's talking about the fact that our constitution is a problem but I'd like to take you back to the national confab that held, and this is not the first by the way. We've had constitutional conferences and we've had similar confabs but the one I'm referring to is the one that was done under the Jonathan administration where a lot of recommendations were put forward. I know it's gathering dust somewhere. Just as he said, the issue on restructuring by the APC as presented by Governor El Rufi is also somewhere gathering dust. I know that you're not a government person but I'm trying to understand here. Why do you think that we spend so much taxpayers' monies to have these tea parties and these so-called conferences and then at the end of the day these papers are gathering dust but then when it's close to election season, most of these same politicians who may have occupied office at one time or the other and want to run again begin to wax lyrical about this issue of restructuring. What exactly is that problem? Well, our problem is insincerity. Many of these things are put together, they are just jump stories. It is to solve the interests of some people, they are very cosmetic, there are things that we don't think through. In the first instance, when John, the former minister, I mean, tells you that there may be crises if we don't restructure and you ask yourself what exactly are we restructuring? Is it just to satisfy the political ego of some people and drum things into their ears that make them sound as if they are speaking something that deals with the interests of the people or just the jamborees they had in the past, I mean, in the first instance, they come from who elected them there. They were all elected, I mean, for you to do a national conference, the people must have elected you there to go and represent them and speak their minds. So they were not elected. You don't even have a national, I mean, you have a national assembly and the question you're asking yourself is why do you want, you know, these are elected officials that went to the national assembly, you know, in the first instance, whether they were now at their primary level, they were selected and whatever manner, how they got in there, but these were people that were supposedly elected. So why do you have, why do you need a selected few, about 500 people to do what exactly we sent those other ones that at the national assembly are the sleeping millions of naira of taxpayers money and they have not done? That is the number one. Number two, what exactly are we restructuring? Are we meant to restructure our minds or to restructure, you know, the political interests of some other people? Let me ask you, you know, this restructuring part of the essence of restructuring is to develop, you know, to develop power to the states and the local governments, right? Okay, let me ask you, how many state governors right now are allowing their local government chairmen to even, you know, to function as a tortilla of government? That is where restructuring... That's a whole conversation on its own. You understand? So that is where restructuring should start. Restructuring should begin with all of us and I will explain. All the governors, they get their locations, local government chairmen are meant to generate the revenues and all of these people. And let me tell you, everybody will tell you, develop power. What power are you developing? We're on the concurrent list of government, the concurrent list of government where the state and the federal, they both, you know, have rights to legislate and all of that. You legislate on housing. How many of these state governors have provided housing for their people? That is the question number one. And they're getting taxpayers' money. They're spending them on what they call security votes and all fictitious things they're spending on. And they will come and tell you, restructuring, they are the same people who are sending different groups to go and be championing restructuring. What is the problem who began restructuring from their home? That is number one on housing. Number three is agriculture. Who has stopped them from, you know, using a Greek to transform the economy of the states? Has anybody actually stopped them from doing that? Number three. Can I just come with you? They're talking about education. Yeah, but in terms of agriculture, I'm not holding brief for the government of the states, but if there has been an easy way out of going cap in hand to the federal government at the end of the month, you know, to get allocation, why would we be looking at agriculture? Easy money. Agriculture. Agriculture is as basic as it is. You have the land with you. You can take people out of poverty with agriculture. How much are they investing? Let every state governor come up and tell us how much they have invested in agriculture. Tell us how much they invested in education. These are the things on the concurrent list. They don't need any devolution of power. I mean, I just mentioned housing. I mentioned education. I mentioned health. I mentioned roads. So these are agriculture. These are major issues that if they focus on, they will transform each state and local government without going cap in hand to the federal government. So when you hear people speak about restructuring, they are bamboozling the people who don't, maybe, the susceptible minds, the gullible ones, the vulnerable ones, who don't know exactly how to demand good governance from their people. Every governor, every governor right now, I don't imagine the state. Every governor are just simply looting. Looting their people crazy and doing nothing. So then if you stop talking about restructuring, restructuring will be given by every. Oh, I think we're having issues with your connection. So I'm going to go back to Dr. Maduka. He's made a very interesting point about issues that need to be addressed and the fact that this is just a lip service of sorts. What do we do to get it to happen? Because election is here. And we're going to hear more of this. It's going to sound like they're going to start sounding like broken records. I was talking about it yesterday. Someone put a thread on Instagram of different politicians captured. One was Frank Akara, another, I think the transportation minister was braiding hair. This was their way of getting to the people because they want our vote. It's about to happen again. What do we do to get these things that they throw around to actually become something if we're really interested in changing Nigeria? Because we can't just keep saying that our leaders are not doing what they promised us. What about our role in making sure that these demands are met? Dr. Maduka. Well, yeah, you will have your demand to be met. If you have the playing ground, as of today, our leaders have improvised people. Poverty has shown everybody a lot of things. Somebody who is hungry will always look for something to eat first before you talk about. So our leaders have used poverty to give people that kind of mindset of nobody. And like you said, most of all, these are political allies. They are benefiting from the jointed construction of this country. So it's going to be very hard for them to change the narrative. It's going to be very hard. And like the other man talked about, the state has their role. The states have their role. But my problem about the state, like Lagos state, is that we cannot generate light without, first of all, asking the federal government. And you know, power is very important if you want to develop it. The state governments cannot do the same things without, first of all, getting approval from the federal government. Let me give you an instance. I did a paper on the wastage of coal in Enugu. Coal in Enugu coal is one of the main source of income to South Africa. Why is coal not in Enugu? Why do we get this in there because of oil? And of course, when I was asking one of the executives there, they say you can't do anything without, first of all, getting approval from a book. So these are the devotions of power we are talking about. The state should be able to have freedom to do what they want to do. That's what is obtainable elsewhere. But then the states cannot do whatever they want to do because our constitution is somewhat limited. You know, ask to a federal system of government of sorts, even though we're running a unitary government. No, no, no, no, I disagree with you. The federal system of government give room for states to be autonomous. Because if you look at the constitution we are using, or the federal unit we are using, it is in America. Every American state is almost like autonomous. Yeah, but in reality, we're running a unitary government. So that's the situation of things. But it's not supposed to be. And that's why I think that man said that we need to demand, we need to demand accountability from each and every one of our leaders. How do we go about demanding this accountability? How? How? Because I want solutions. For instance, let me just give an instance. I come from up there. How many times have I heard about my abbey state giving me all the projects, expenditure and the income expenditure as per a month? Don't do that. We are supposed to be seeing this thing so that you can be able to track what and what they've been able to do with the money they got from Abuja. Let me put it out. What have they been able to do with the money they got from IGR, internal revenue, internal generated revenue? But as of today, everything is like nothing is happening. Like he said, they are just looting right hand vote. And of course, you know election is just around the corner. So this is the time for them to mop up money. For instance, what are you talking about? It's a critical vote. A governor can just decide to take one billion as a security vote. And nobody talks about it. So this is the issue. And that's why I was changing on that constitution. I'm not a pessimist, but the issue is that the constitution, when you have a foundation that is strong, there's nothing else you can do. Build the base of this high scraper if you collapse around what happened recently because the foundation is wrong. But the earlier, the better. If we can be able to come back and say what is it that we need to do? Then let's see how we can, at least amend the whatever we can. All right, let me quickly go to that point because we're almost out of time. Mr. Danmola, quickly, I want solutions. We've seen how the push and shove from Nigerians, whether it's online offline, whether we went to protest, whether people were arrested and shoved into black Marias. We've seen what has come out of it and the reports from the panel that sat in Lagos. Nigerians are still hoping that something will come out of it. But how, aside from that, how do we also use the same tactics or something different to get our leaders to be more accountable to us if they've ever been accountable to us in any way? Well, in the first instance, let me tell you what the major challenge is on the political scene in Nigeria. Our politics is driven by Brigand de Jantogre. Go to almost every state in this country. You have an army of thugs, an army of, call them whatever, violent men who have been sponsored by these politicians who, even when you rise up to even say, well, you become a target, that's why you can see even at Beirut's in Lagos here, generating over how many billions of nair because they have the latitude to do so. So it tells you that and go everywhere, they're everywhere. So what I'm saying invariably is that the nature of politics we play is not allowing for critical participation. People who should drive the process are intelligentsia. So people who have clear mind as to how to move the country forward. But the people we have are elements who are even far more powerful than those who are in the National Assembly. As we speak today, you yourself can recollect how some thugs run into the National Assembly, hijacked the midst of the assembly and today nothing has been done. We can go on and on about many things that have happened. We have a president in this country who did all sorts, you know, and she had to go and, you know, many of these political thugs in Nevada and all these places were mobilized to do all sorts. So all I'm saying is, is there a picture of bloom? Let me just, let me say this. Quickly because we're out of time, we're out of time. For me, yeah, for me, you have five critical sectors that are within the powers of the states to transform the fortunes of their people. I have mentioned housing, I have mentioned health, I have mentioned agriculture, and I have mentioned road and I have mentioned education. Let the state governors, they don't need to, you don't need to ask for any restructuring yet. I have said two things. These five critical sectors, go and look at all the roads in Lagos. How many of the roads are fixed in Lagos? How many of the inner roads are fixed in Nevada? How many of the inner roads are fixed in Nundo? Let me go and fix their roads first. We have to go. And be able for the people who are generating the tax, you will go and build houses for them. Make the hospitals functional in their states. Make the housing affordable in their states. You can go and chair, man, a proper tortilla arm of government. Stop wasting our time on the structuring. And fix this monster down on the concurrent list. Now you don't need to go to court or anything to do. Stop bamboozling the vulnerable and the susceptible in the society. Give us good governance. I can tell from the passion in your voice. I can tell from the passion in your voice that you're sick and tired of this banter of restructuring. But Dakwada Amola, Sonny Madukah, thank you very much for being part of the conversation. We appreciate it. Thank you. My pleasure. All right. And I want to thank you all for staying with us and being part of the conversation. I am Mary Ann Acon. We'll leave you with this Vox Pop, worst Nigerians reacting to the reports released by the Ligestate Incest Judicial Panel. I'll see you tomorrow. I want to believe that what the result of the panel is is actually the truth. Because according to what we saw online, people were killed. And they said that their dead bodies were carried away by the soldiers to cover up what actually happened. So now going by the results that this thing actually happened is giving us hope that justice is taking place. And also it makes us to know that in future that the government is going to be taking steps in such a way that whatever policies that they are bringing out will not be anti-people. Because now that people can realize that their hope in Nigerian legal system has not faded away. We just hope, a revival of hope for all Nigerians in the outcome of Ligestate Incest Judicial Panel that look into what happened last year. So it was giving Nigerians hope that there is still something to believe in this country, socially in the court of justice. So we are very happy to that. And then also it's giving us another implication of what we believe about our government and about our leaders. When they just concluded that there was no atom of shooting and nobody was nothing like shooting and the CNN, other people who were present at the scene were just lying. But at the end of it, the truth come out. So we just appreciate those, the panel and then all those one who were involved in digging inside the truth to get it out. And then it also gives the youth opportunity to believe in their country, in our country. So we are very much happy. And then we still hope for more to come. They normally say that the future is for the youth. But what is happening in our country today is not giving us hope as a youth. And it's not telling us that the future is bright for us until the needful is done. They need to do the right thing. They need to bring the people involved to justice. That will give us the youth hope that our leaders who are before us have a future for us. But if they don't do that, there is no justice. There is no sanction. There is no bringing back to book all those people that committed those crimes. There is no hope for the youth in this country. No matter what, the lives that were lost would not be brought back. So there is nothing to say about it. We want to believe that.