Former National Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Attahiru Jega, has said for Nigeria to grow and develop, it must restructure its current federal system, which he said was not balance and poorly managed.
Jega stated this in a recent paper he delivered at the 4th public lecture at Nasarawa State University, Keffi and argued that “restructuring is highly inevitable and the time to start is now.”
In the paper titled, ‘Restructuring the Nigerian Federation: Challenges and Prospects,’ he said, “As a way out of the logjam, the country must come to terms with the challenges and prospects of restructuring. We need to come to terms with the fact that restructuring is necessary.”
Jega made it known that the approach and mechanism deployed in chasing the agenda were very important in achieving the desired goal.
He asked: “The fundamental question yearning for an answer is: how can the Nigerian federation be restructured to make it efficient and effective in satisfying the needs and aspirations of its citizens, to substantively manage diversity, to forge unity and sense of belonging for and by all, and to bring about democratic and socio-economic development beneficial to all citizens?”
As a solution, Jega recommended a three-phase restructuring agenda in line with what he termed as the “principle of incremental positive changes.”
He proposed that restructuring could be carried in the short term, 2021-2023; medium-term, 2023-2027; and long term, beyond 2027.
In the short term, Jega proposed that the Federal Government should constitute a compact but broadly representative committee to review every previous report of the political reform conference (2006) and national conference (2014) to synthesise and prioritise their recommendations for implementation.
In the medium term, he proposed that the prioritised recommendations of the technical committee should be implemented by the government and the government should hand over more responsibilities and resources to states.
In the long term plan, Jega suggested that Nigeria should consolidate the gains, speed up the governance process to satisfy the basic needs and aspirations of the citizens, and intensify sustainable socio-economic development through good governance.
