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Friday, February 16, 2001
A recent editorial by TEMPO Magazine fantastically deconstructing President Obasanjo's "woolly" "no-two-sovereigns" argument against the Sovereign National Conference (SNC) is a wonderful testament to the powerful logic that some writers in our Nigerian media can muster, logic which is captured in these memorable words:
This is what we believe is self-serving, patronising and self-justifying. Mr. President is NOT the state. It is unacceptable. Put simply, if Mr. President sincerely believes in the sovereignty of the people, the people should be allowed to decide whether or not they want a conference."
There are other both sad and sinister sides to this sordid argument.
First, it sadly shows that the President has not availed himself of intelligent advice to steer him away from elevating his anti-SNC stance - which he has every right to - from this alarming view of himself as being at the same both ABOVE the people and BELOW the people. This Janus-like approach to leadership is bound to lead to nothing but chaos in the land if it permeates decision-making.
The sinister aspect reminds one of General Abacha, when back in 1994 he imprisoned Chief MKO Abiola for declaring himself president, because as he (Abacha) was the then sitting head of state, there could not be "two sovereigns." Thus, by the same analogy, it is not a stretch to presume that the new underlying assumption is that all those of us who are advocating for SNC are actually at the threshold of committing a treasonable felony.
I hope that it never comes to that.
With respect to the state or local police, the TEMPO article retorts in another simple but stellar fashion:
Case ALMOST closed, for by focusing ONLY on one phantom fear, the president and those who share that fear INSIST to learn a wrong lesson ONLY from their past, and refuse to learn a RIGHT lesson from others elsewhere in the world.
Take for example the United States, the exemplar of federal systems in the world. Not a perfect place by any stretch of the imagination, but having practised the system for so long, and refining it as she has gone along, it is incumbent on those countries like Nigeria practising a "federal" system to ask how it is working in the US, or how it is not. It is not to ape it, but at least to learn it.
But we should not just ask the government officials, or just read the US Constitution: we should ask the people.
Well, a number of American people were asked recently. A survey of 1,830 randomly selected US adults was conducted between October 25 and November 18 of 2000 by the Pew Partnership for Civic Change, a civic research organization funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and administerd by the
University of Richmond. Here are the results, reported in the Washington Post of Thursday, February 1, 2001. It is reproduced below:
Yes - the local police department ranked more than twice the rate of the federal government, just less than twice state government officials and 15 points higher than local government officials! In short, Americans can so insulate their police from government influence to such an extent that they are considered pretty important by the populace in solving social problems - not as an instrument of government coercion. Why can we not do the same? Is it not clear that the many layers of civil society - faith-based, voluntary organizations, PTAs, even friends and neighbors etc. - all of which we also have - can provide a layer of insulation from the such government-sponsored abuse? Why are we so stuck with the past fears? In conclusion, these two issues of "sovereignty" and "state police" are related: the existence of several layers of security, particularly of the local kind, is consistence with the devolution of power in a truly federal system. Such a truly federal system can only be guaranteed via a constitution owned by the people. If we are not to fritter away our chances to become a great nation, the construction of that popular constitution must be through a sovereign national conference. And sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria.
Tempo EDITORIAL, February 22, 2001, Lagos Posted to the web February 15, 2001 Excerpt President Olusegun Obasanjo's working visit to Oyo State has produced useful insight on the understanding of Mr. President on some fundamental issues of governance in the country. While in Oyo State, the president objected to a Sovereign National Conference (SNC), the creation of state
police and he articulated his position on the notion of sovereignty. We have strong reasons to disagree with Mr. President on these issues. These we shall state shortly
Obasanjo Damns State Police, National Confab
Excerpt President Olusegun Obasanjo revisited, yesterday, agitation for a sovereign national conference in the country, vowing never to surrender to anyone or group in the name of a conference, the sovereignty entrusted in his care by Nigerians. He also dismissed calls for state police and kicked against violence in the South-West. President Obasanjo spoke at a civic reception in his honour at the Liberty Stadium, Ibadan on the first day of his visit to Oyo State.
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