eldoradoxx: South always insists on the artificial division into SE, SW and SS. When it comes to North, u often hear of one North/Arewa and their Governors meet regularly as one North. The first time Southern Governors ever agreed to seat together as a bloc was the last meeting held in Asaba where they banned open grazing in the South.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but I want to correct one impression, the last meeting at Asaba was not the first time that southern governors have met together.
The Southern Governors Forum was created sometime between 1999 and 2001 to fight the on-shore and off-shore dichotomy issue. They had many meetings between 1999 and 2007.
naptu2: The Southern Governors Forum helped to coordinate the lawsuits against the Federal Government during the onshore and offshore dichotomy disagreement of the early 2000s. They met regularly at that time.
However, in recent times the Southern Governors' Wives Forum has been more active than the Governors Forum.
A few previous meetings of the Southern Governors Forum.
Teams at Euro 2020 could face fines if their players move drinks provided by sponsors at news conferences, as Cristiano Ronaldo and Paul Pogba have done in recent days.
On Monday, Portugal captain Ronaldo removed two bottles of Coca-Cola and encouraged people to drink water.
The next day, France midfielder Pogba, a practising Muslim, discreetly removed a bottle of Heineken beer.
Italy's Manuel Locatelli also replaced Coca-Cola with water on Wednesday.
"Uefa has reminded participating teams that partnerships are integral to the delivery of the tournament and to ensuring the development of football across Europe, including for youth and women," tournament organisers said on Thursday.
Uefa's Euro 2020 tournament director Martin Kallen said players were contractually obliged "through their federation of the tournament regulations to follow".
However, he said he understood the actions of players who, like Pogba, did such things for religious reasons.
Teams have been reminded of their contractual regulations and Kallen said disciplinary action was "a possibility".
Uefa does not intend to directly fine players and any sanctions are at the discretion of the national federations.
"We are never fining players directly from the Uefa side, we will do this always through the participating national association and then they could look if they will go further to the player, but we are not going directly for the moment to the player," Kallen said.
"We have the regulations signed by the participating federations."
Please note that aikyg has provided further proof by referring us to the pre-conference summit that was held in 1994.
aikyg: Here is an excerpt from the original article written in 2010:
At the Mkpoko Igbo pre-Conference summit in Enugu in April 1994, a document that called for the creation of six geo-political zones, the zoning of top political offices (especially the presidency) and rotation of power among the six zones was fashioned out.
There would be three zones in the North, including a separate zone for Northern minorities, and three in the South, including another separate zone for the Southern minorities.
The Igbo elite mandated former Vice President, Dr Alex Ekwueme, to lead the presentation of this agenda at the Conference, with Chief Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu and Dr Sam Mbakwe as his able lieutenants.
Ekwueme did a fantastic job, but the North, which opposed the geo-political zones and zoning of the presidency, accused him of trying to break up the North and whittle down its influence, which was not far from the truth, anyway. This was one of their reasons for dumping him for Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999.
It was also due to the efforts of another group of Igbo intelligentsia led by retired Commodore Okoh Ebitu Ukiwe that led General Sani Abacha to create Bayelsa and Ebonyi states on October 1, 1996 , while also approving the geo-political zones, even though it is not (yet) in the Constitution as the Igbo recommended.
Someone did not read the interview and came up with a ridiculous claim that has been proved wrong in the interview. He is confronted by it and his response is to come up with another claim that has already been addressed by the title of the entire thread!
How can anyone take such a person seriously.
READ THE FRIGGIN TITLE!
By the way, how can the idea that someone proposed something that is noble and who had good intentions when he proposed it, be something that will lead to hate??
I am now going to allow myself to be entertained by the jesters.
gidgiddy: Look, there may be laws that require the President to appoint people from certain areas.
My point is that those areas are not recognized as anything 'special' in the constitution
Why are you repeating what I wrote in the original post? I wrote that they are not recognised by the constitution, but they are recognised by several acts of the National Assembly. Is that not what I wrote??
The zones are not recognised in the constitution, but they are recognised by several acts that have been passed by the National Assembly. These acts require the president to appoint people from all the 6 geopolitical zones into several commissions and boards.
The other problem is caused by people who are too lazy to read. They will come and tell you that something that is in the article is not in the article. This is because they have not actually read the article.
Someone will tell you that Alex Ekwueme did not say South-South, when this is what he said in the interview.
"And in the South you have the minorities in the former Midwestern Region and the minority of the Southeast region who together formed the South-South."
Has anybody on Nairaland ever asked for the meaning of the terms, North-East, North-West, North-Central, South-East or South-West?
Yet check out how many threads have been created to ask for the meaning of South-South!
This question has also been posed on threads that are not even about the south-south!
This thread is an answer to those questions. I got tired of answering the question on individual threads (as I've done many times) and decided to put everything in one thread.
Attempts (by people who cannot address the issue) to derail the thread by talking about hatred is a complete waste of time. Firstly, nothing in this thread refers to Igbos exclusively, neither does it discuss hatred for Igbos.
They are trying an old and failed dog whistle, which is to blind people from facts by whipping up emotions and sentiments.
It is a complete waste of time
I know exactly what to do if you keep trying to derail the thread. Just try me and see.
naptu2: Here are some of the threads in which this question has been asked.
gidgiddy: It was accepted by Abacha, but no law or act supports it. The constitution does not recognize anything like South/South or any other Region for that matter
"No law or acts recognise it"
Go back and read the first post, I posted links to the acts/laws that recognise it.
Take your time and read slowly. I addressed this issue in that post.
naptu2: It is always the case that people who cannot discuss issues (wo don't have the brain power and emotional fortitude to discuss issues) always resort to discussing personalities. They cannot engage with ideas so they resort to ad hominem attacks against people that discuss these issues.
Hate, bigotry, anger, fights, insults, those are the only things that they understand and it's the only thing that they can engage with. It's all they do and all they see in others. They cannot discuss issues.
The craziest and funniest idea here is from the people that ignorantly claim that this has something to do with hatred for Igbos. That level of ignorance is astounding. What the heck does this have to do with the Igbo ethnic group??
Is it because Dr Ekwueme is Igbo?
This idea was created by Dr Alex Ekwueme. Ekwueme is one man. He is not every Igbo person. The idea was his. It is not the idea of every Igbo person.
Does this also mean hatred for Yorubas, because Chief Onabanjo contributed to the idea?
Does it mean hatred for Kanuris because Abacha accepted the idea?
Or does it mean hatred for the entire Nigeria because the National Assembly adopted the idea in several acts?
The level of silliness is shocking.
I believe that sensible people know that that argument makes no sense. The people who are trying to derail the thread with such nonsense are only doing it because they want to stop me from answering questions and busting myths. They can never stop me.
aikyg: Here is an excerpt from the original article written in 2010:
At the Mkpoko Igbo pre-Conference summit in Enugu in April 1994, a document that called for the creation of six geo-political zones, the zoning of top political offices (especially the presidency) and rotation of power among the six zones was fashioned out.
There would be three zones in the North, including a separate zone for Northern minorities, and three in the South, including another separate zone for the Southern minorities.
The Igbo elite mandated former Vice President, Dr Alex Ekwueme, to lead the presentation of this agenda at the Conference, with Chief Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu and Dr Sam Mbakwe as his able lieutenants.
Ekwueme did a fantastic job, but the North, which opposed the geo-political zones and zoning of the presidency, accused him of trying to break up the North and whittle down its influence, which was not far from the truth, anyway. This was one of their reasons for dumping him for Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999.
It was also due to the efforts of another group of Igbo intelligentsia led by retired Commodore Okoh Ebitu Ukiwe that led General Sani Abacha to create Bayelsa and Ebonyi states on October 1, 1996 , while also approving the geo-political zones, even though it is not (yet) in the Constitution as the Igbo recommended.
Great, so simple chronology solves this issue. Which came first, 1983-1985 when Ekwueme was in prison and developed this idea or 1994 when he presented it to this pre-conference summit?
(I already know that all regions had their pre-conference summits. In fact, the Northern pre-conference summit is on YouTube. That is where people present their ideas and it's where Dr Ekwueme presented his idea, but the idea existed before 1994).
It is always the case that people who cannot discuss issues (who don't have the brain power and emotional fortitude to discuss issues) always resort to discussing personalities. They cannot engage with ideas so they resort to ad hominem attacks against people that discuss these issues.
Hate, bigotry, anger, fights, insults, those are the only things that they understand and it's the only thing that they can engage with. It's all they do and all they see in others. They cannot discuss issues.
aikyg: Yes, but that does not change the fact that he was the highest ranking Igbo military officer at the time. Serving or retired.
No he wasn't. (I am hoping that you will ask me who was higher).
Secondly, you said that he executed it. How could he execute it when he was not in office?
Furthermore, apart from getting Ukiwe's position wrong, you have stated, without any evidence, that Alex Ekwueme, who you admit was a member of the group you talked about, was wrong in his description of how the idea of the South-South was created.
Dr Ekwueme was detailed in his description of how he created the idea and how the only other person that contributed to the idea was Bisi Onabanjo (read the interview). Can you provide proof and evidence to show why we should believe you over Dr Ekwueme?
What makes your word more credible than Dr Ekwueme's?
The only other person who contributed to it was my friend, Bisi Onabanjo. Two of us discussed this in prison.
aikyg: It was not Alex Ekwueme that the idea of the South-South zone. The South-South zone was created by the Igbo intelligentsia, a group within the Ohaneze Ndigbo. Ekwueme just happened to be a member of the Igbo Intelligentsia. Also being the highest ranking political office holder alive at the time (serving or retired), he was asked to lead the group at the Constitutional Conference. He did a good job at the constitutional conference, but the Northerners voted it down.
Ebuti Ukiwe, I believe, was the one who eventually executed the plan, being the highest ranking Igbo military officer at the time.
aikyg: It was not Alex Ekwueme that the idea of the South-South zone. The South-South zone was created by the Igbo intelligentsia, a group within the Ohaneze Ndigbo. Ekwueme just happened to be a member of the Igbo Intelligentsia. Also being the highest ranking political office holder alive at the time, he was asked to lead the group at the Constitutional Conference. He did a good job at the constitutional conference, but the Northerners voted it down.
Ebuti Ukiwe, I believe, was the one who eventually executed the plan, being the highest ranking Igbo military officer at the time.
Ebitu Ukiwe was removed from office on October 1st, 1986, long before the 1995 constitutional conference. I remember that day very well. I even remember what Taiwo Obileye said during the national broadcast and what Babangida wore.
Basically this was the idea of Dr Alex Ekwueme and it was accepted by General Abacha and then accepted by the National Assembly (which has included it in several acts).
Nairalanders have often asked, "What is the South-South? Who created the South-South Zone"? This thread answers those questions.
The South-South is a geopolitical zone in Nigeria. It represents the southernmost part of Southern Nigeria. It is a geopolitical region and like other geopolitical regions of the world, it is not dependent on compass points. There's no Middle East or Far East on a compass, yet these are regarded as regions of the world, just as there is no Midwest or South-Central on a compass, but these are geopolitical regions of the United States.
The South-South is one of the 6 geopolitical zones in Nigeria and the 6 zones are: North-Central, North-East, North-West, South-East, South-South and South-West. The zones are not recognised in the constitution, but they are recognised by several acts that have been passed by the National Assembly. These acts require the president to appoint people from all the 6 geopolitical zones into several commissions and boards.
The idea of the 6 geopolitical zones was developed by former Vice President Dr Alex Ekwueme and former Ogun State Governor, Chief Bisi Onabanjo, when they were in prison between 1983 and 1985. Dr Ekwueme was the brain behind the idea, while Chief Onabanjo made contributions.
The basic idea was to provide equality between the regions of Nigeria. During the 1st Republic, Northern Nigeria was bigger than the other 2 regions (East and West) combined and there were always fears that it would dominate the country. Dr Ekwueme decided to address this issue by creating a balance.
Furthermore, minority ethnic groups were always complaining that they were being dominated by the 3 big ethnic groups and so his idea was developed in such a way that the minorities would have a voice.
In his idea, there would be an Eastern Region which would be mainly made up of the Igbo ethnic group and a Western Region that would be mainly made up of the Yoruba ethnic group. There would then be a South-South Region that would be mainly made up of the southern minorities.
There would also be a North-Western Region which would be mainly made up of the Hausa and Fulani ethnic groups and a North-East Region which would be mainly made up of the Kanuri ethnic group. There would then be a North-Central Region that would be mainly made up of the minorities in the North.
Dr Ekwueme presented his ideas to former President Shehu Shagari when he left prison. President Shagari had previously suggested something similar, but he told Dr Ekwueme that he had abandoned the idea because people did not accept it.
Dr Ekwueme then presented the idea at the 1995 Constitutional Conference. The idea was rejected, but the head of state, General Abacha, liked and accepted it.
In this interview Dr Ekwueme explains how and why he came up with the idea. The interview was conducted and published a few years before his death and it was republished after his death.
How Ekwueme, Bisi Onabanjo plotted six geopolitical zones from prison
ON NOVEMBER 25, 2017 5:59 AM
The idea of the six geopolitical zones looks brilliant. Was it your idea alone?
The only other person who contributed to it was my friend, Bisi Onabanjo. Two of us discussed this in prison.
It was from there you now took it to the Constitutional Conference where it was adopted? Well, it wasn’t. But Abacha adopted it. The conference itself didn’t adopt it; they wanted the status quo to remain because it was in the interest of some people to maintain the status quo.
Some have suggested the abolition of the states and for the six geopolitical zones to become the federating bodies. Do you concur?
The states don’t have to be abolished. It is a matter of nomenclature. When we had Eastern Region, we had 12 provinces which Michael Okpara created. Ogoja province, Calabar Province, Uyo Province, Annang Province, Enugu Province, Onitsha Province, Owerri Province, Umuahia Province and Port-Harcourt Province, Degema Province. There were six provinces in the minority areas and six in the Igbo areas, and all these provinces had their provincial commissioners, had their assemblies and had their provincial scholarship boards.
So, it is a matter of nomenclature. The states should be provinces of the regions. I am putting together a book called Nigeria: Thoughts on the provision of a stable polity, and in that book, there is an article by Shehu Shagari that states should become provinces of the regions.
Eventually, when I met with him when I was putting together these ideas, he said that he found that his suggestion was not very well accepted, so he wasn’t pursuing it anymore.
What kind of political structure do you think will make Nigeria politically and economically viable?
Going back to history we negotiated over a decade starting from Ibadan Conference in 1951 up to the conferences in Nigeria in London and so on until independence in 1960 – a ten year period of negotiation and in the end what Nigerians agreed with the colonial masters on what would be the form of government on the basis of which they would be given independence was a federal form of government made up of three regions – North, East and West.
That was the form of government agreed with each region autonomous in many respects and with each region having its own Constitution and the Constitutions of the three regions annexed to the Federal Constitution in one document and with each region being able to develop at its own pace.
You will see for instance, Eastern Region that started as the poorest region, by 1966 the leadership had established agricultural plantations, rubber, cocoa plantations in Cross River State, palm in Anambra, Imo, Rivers and so on and they had industries, like Trans Amadi Industrial Estate in Port Harcourt, they were able to negotiate with foreign countries and were able to build the brewery in Umuahia, ceramic factory in Umuahia, the Calabar Cement Factory and there was development. They were able to build the University of Nigeria before the Federal Government took it over ten years after.
So, each region was given the freedom to exercise its initiative. It was Eastern Region that first started the Pay As You Earn tax in Nigeria. That was the creation of -21- Bon Ejike— the first minister of finance of Eastern Region in 1952 – Pay As You Earn, automatic deduction from salary. It was first started in Eastern Nigeria because when the region was founded they had to find means of raising money. It was in the East that they first started Entertainment Tax, if you went to cinema if it was One and Six, you paid three pence tax to the government.
People used their initiative. If you went to the North you would find groundnut pyramids in Kano everywhere. In the West, cocoa was booming and they used it to invest property in Lagos, Western House, WEMABOD, Cocoa House in Ibadan all that was based on the initiative. Even free education in the West and so on.
I did my analysis while I was in Kirikiri Prison, the only problem with the form of government that we had with that structure was that it was lopsided. The structure of the regions at independence was such that one region, the North was said to have been bigger than the two other regions, East and West and when even Mid-West was created the North was still bigger than East, West and Midwest and in a parliamentary system based on population, the membership of the parliament allocated more seats to Northern Region than to all other regions put together.
If as they did in the North, they all decided to go into one party, a Northern party, and they elected all their legislators on that party, then they would continue to have the leadership of the country for ever which would not be palatable to the rest of the country. That was one fault in the disparity in the size of the regions.
The second problem I discovered was that within each region, you had majority group and a group of minorities. In the West, the Yoruba were the majority group, and the minority group was what grouped together in what became the Midwest. In the East, the Igbo were the majority and the minority group called themselves the COR State – Calabar, Ogoja, Rivers. In the North, Hausa Fulani were the majority group and the minority were mostly the Middle Belt and to some extent, the Kanuri.
So, you had a struggle within each region between the majority and the minority. So, I decided to cure these two problems that we must have parity of regions between the Old North and the Old South and that was why I decided to have parity of geopolitical zones between the North and the South.
And it also helped to have parity between the majority regions and the minority regions; the majority regions being in the Northwest, mostly Hausa-Fulani, Southwest, mostly Yoruba and the Southeast , mostly Igbo; and the minority regions being Northeast where you have the Kanuri with a number of ethnic groups in Bauchi, Gombe, Adamawa and Taraba; and in the North Central you have Benue, Plateau, Nasarawa, Kogi, Kwara, Niger; and in the South you have the minorities in the former Midwestern Region and the minority of the Southeast region who together formed the South-South.
So instead of three regions, you now have six regions; three majority, three minority; three in the North, three in the South – parity between North and South, parity between majority and minority and the apportionment of representation would be as we negotiated with our colonial masters on the basis of which we got our independence.
What of representation at the National Assembly?
That will have to recognise the type of assembly we should have. Before we had a House of Representatives which was a House of the people based on population and we had a Senate which was based on equality of the regions.
So, in a real federation, the lower House represents the equality of all human beings within the country. Like in America, a state like Rhode Island will have two senators, New York will have two senators, California will have two senators, all the states will have two senators showing equality of the states in the upper chamber and equality of human beings means that New York may have 50 men in the House of Representatives whereas Nevada or North Dakota may have just two or three.
So would you go along with those who say that we should adopt a unicameral legislature to reduce cost?
In a federation, it won’t be wise to have one legislative body as you will have nothing to show that all the federating units are equal. It is the upper chamber that signifies the equality of the federating units.
The only problem is that we copied and abused it whereby we have full-time lawmakers. In the First Republic they had only one Long Session which lasted about six weeks for the consideration of the Appropriation Act and then another one for the Supplementary Appropriation Act, so they had two major sessions, and any other session was an emergency session lasting a few days, and they were all part-time members.
When they came, they were quartered in flats LEGCO Flats and they got sitting allowances on top of their salaries and salary wasn’t very much. Many of them were teachers, some local government officials and so on. But now, everybody who goes to the House of Representatives is a full-time person; he needs a fully furnished house, he needs legislative aides, he needs a constituency office.
Yes, all these are supposed to enhance the legislative process, but they cost a lot of money and how far this competence is enhanced is a matter of concern to some well-meaning people, because you find that some of these constituency offices, and there are some around here, you go there, and you just find a table and a chair, and you ask whether this is where a member of the House of Representatives is going to sit down and draft laws to be presented to the National Assembly? So, it is not a matter of having a single chamber just to save cost.
It is a matter of not adopting the American system hook, line, and sinker. But even in America, the congressmen have just modest accommodation in Washington; they take every opportunity to go back to their constituencies to stay with the people who elected them and to brief them on what is happening.
Will you then suggest that we go back to the parliamentary system with part-time legislators?
I am not advocating for a parliamentary system. I am ok with the presidential system, but it doesn’t have to have two chambers with full-time legislators assigned with a lot of staff, having staff at home and staff in Abuja.
zhuche: Since the president considered people of the south east as dot, I've been thinking and wondering how South South came about.
We don't have anything like North North or East East or West West
So how come South South?
Please anyone with an explanation?
How Ekwueme, Bisi Onabanjo plotted six geopolitical zones from prison
ON NOVEMBER 25, 2017 5:59 AM
The idea of the six geopolitical zones looks brilliant. Was it your idea alone?
The only other person who contributed to it was my friend, Bisi Onabanjo. Two of us discussed this in prison.
It was from there you now took it to the Constitutional Conference where it was adopted? Well, it wasn’t. But Abacha adopted it. The conference itself didn’t adopt it; they wanted the status quo to remain because it was in the interest of some people to maintain the status quo.
Some have suggested the abolition of the states and for the six geopolitical zones to become the federating bodies. Do you concur?
The states don’t have to be abolished. It is a matter of nomenclature. When we had Eastern Region, we had 12 provinces which Michael Okpara created. Ogoja province, Calabar Province, Uyo Province, Annang Province, Enugu Province, Onitsha Province, Owerri Province, Umuahia Province and Port-Harcourt Province, Degema Province. There were six provinces in the minority areas and six in the Igbo areas, and all these provinces had their provincial commissioners, had their assemblies and had their provincial scholarship boards.
So, it is a matter of nomenclature. The states should be provinces of the regions. I am putting together a book called Nigeria: Thoughts on the provision of a stable polity, and in that book, there is an article by Shehu Shagari that states should become provinces of the regions.
Eventually, when I met with him when I was putting together these ideas, he said that he found that his suggestion was not very well accepted, so he wasn’t pursuing it anymore.
What kind of political structure do you think will make Nigeria politically and economically viable?
Going back to history we negotiated over a decade starting from Ibadan Conference in 1951 up to the conferences in Nigeria in London and so on until independence in 1960 – a ten year period of negotiation and in the end what Nigerians agreed with the colonial masters on what would be the form of government on the basis of which they would be given independence was a federal form of government made up of three regions – North, East and West.
That was the form of government agreed with each region autonomous in many respects and with each region having its own Constitution and the Constitutions of the three regions annexed to the Federal Constitution in one document and with each region being able to develop at its own pace.
You will see for instance, Eastern Region that started as the poorest region, by 1966 the leadership had established agricultural plantations, rubber, cocoa plantations in Cross River State, palm in Anambra, Imo, Rivers and so on and they had industries, like Trans Amadi Industrial Estate in Port Harcourt, they were able to negotiate with foreign countries and were able to build the brewery in Umuahia, ceramic factory in Umuahia, the Calabar Cement Factory and there was development. They were able to build the University of Nigeria before the Federal Government took it over ten years after.
So, each region was given the freedom to exercise its initiative. It was Eastern Region that first started the Pay As You Earn tax in Nigeria. That was the creation of -21- Bon Ejike— the first minister of finance of Eastern Region in 1952 – Pay As You Earn, automatic deduction from salary. It was first started in Eastern Nigeria because when the region was founded they had to find means of raising money. It was in the East that they first started Entertainment Tax, if you went to cinema if it was One and Six, you paid three pence tax to the government.
People used their initiative. If you went to the North you would find groundnut pyramids in Kano everywhere. In the West, cocoa was booming and they used it to invest property in Lagos, Western House, WEMABOD, Cocoa House in Ibadan all that was based on the initiative. Even free education in the West and so on.
I did my analysis while I was in Kirikiri Prison, the only problem with the form of government that we had with that structure was that it was lopsided. The structure of the regions at independence was such that one region, the North was said to have been bigger than the two other regions, East and West and when even Mid-West was created the North was still bigger than East, West and Midwest and in a parliamentary system based on population, the membership of the parliament allocated more seats to Northern Region than to all other regions put together.
If as they did in the North, they all decided to go into one party, a Northern party, and they elected all their legislators on that party, then they would continue to have the leadership of the country for ever which would not be palatable to the rest of the country. That was one fault in the disparity in the size of the regions.
The second problem I discovered was that within each region, you had majority group and a group of minorities. In the West, the Yoruba were the majority group, and the minority group was what grouped together in what became the Midwest. In the East, the Igbo were the majority and the minority group called themselves the COR State – Calabar, Ogoja, Rivers. In the North, Hausa Fulani were the majority group and the minority were mostly the Middle Belt and to some extent, the Kanuri.
So, you had a struggle within each region between the majority and the minority. So, I decided to cure these two problems that we must have parity of regions between the Old North and the Old South and that was why I decided to have parity of geopolitical zones between the North and the South.
And it also helped to have parity between the majority regions and the minority regions; the majority regions being in the Northwest, mostly Hausa-Fulani, Southwest, mostly Yoruba and the Southeast , mostly Igbo; and the minority regions being Northeast where you have the Kanuri with a number of ethnic groups in Bauchi, Gombe, Adamawa and Taraba; and in the North Central you have Benue, Plateau, Nasarawa, Kogi, Kwara, Niger; and in the South you have the minorities in the former Midwestern Region and the minority of the Southeast region who together formed the South-South.
So instead of three regions, you now have six regions; three majority, three minority; three in the North, three in the South – parity between North and South, parity between majority and minority and the apportionment of representation would be as we negotiated with our colonial masters on the basis of which we got our independence.
What of representation at the National Assembly?
That will have to recognise the type of assembly we should have. Before we had a House of Representatives which was a House of the people based on population and we had a Senate which was based on equality of the regions.
So, in a real federation, the lower House represents the equality of all human beings within the country. Like in America, a state like Rhode Island will have two senators, New York will have two senators, California will have two senators, all the states will have two senators showing equality of the states in the upper chamber and equality of human beings means that New York may have 50 men in the House of Representatives whereas Nevada or North Dakota may have just two or three.
So would you go along with those who say that we should adopt a unicameral legislature to reduce cost?
In a federation, it won’t be wise to have one legislative body as you will have nothing to show that all the federating units are equal. It is the upper chamber that signifies the equality of the federating units.
The only problem is that we copied and abused it whereby we have full-time lawmakers. In the First Republic they had only one Long Session which lasted about six weeks for the consideration of the Appropriation Act and then another one for the Supplementary Appropriation Act, so they had two major sessions, and any other session was an emergency session lasting a few days, and they were all part-time members.
When they came, they were quartered in flats LEGCO Flats and they got sitting allowances on top of their salaries and salary wasn’t very much. Many of them were teachers, some local government officials and so on. But now, everybody who goes to the House of Representatives is a full-time person; he needs a fully furnished house, he needs legislative aides, he needs a constituency office.
Yes, all these are supposed to enhance the legislative process, but they cost a lot of money and how far this competence is enhanced is a matter of concern to some well-meaning people, because you find that some of these constituency offices, and there are some around here, you go there, and you just find a table and a chair, and you ask whether this is where a member of the House of Representatives is going to sit down and draft laws to be presented to the National Assembly? So, it is not a matter of having a single chamber just to save cost.
It is a matter of not adopting the American system hook, line, and sinker. But even in America, the congressmen have just modest accommodation in Washington; they take every opportunity to go back to their constituencies to stay with the people who elected them and to brief them on what is happening.
Will you then suggest that we go back to the parliamentary system with part-time legislators?
I am not advocating for a parliamentary system. I am ok with the presidential system, but it doesn’t have to have two chambers with full-time legislators assigned with a lot of staff, having staff at home and staff in Abuja.
zhuche: Since the president considered people of the south east as dot, I've been thinking and wondering how South South came about.
We don't have anything like North North or East East or West West
So how come South South?
Please anyone with an explanation?
Former Vice President Alex Ekwueme created it. It is a geo-political region and you don't have to have North-North, East-East or West-West in order to have South-South (It's just like how you have the Mid-West and the South-Central in the United States. Even the world is divided into geo-political regions like the Middle-East and the Far East). I will post Ekwueme's explanation of why he created it.
Politics › Re: How Alex Ekwueme Created The Idea Of The South-South Zone. by naptu2(op): 9:54am On Jun 18, 2021*. Modified: 10:29am On Jun 19, 2021
