Mark: Constitution review won’t work unless…

Speaking in Asaba, Delta State Capital, during the retreat of the Senate Committee on Constitution Review, Mark said: “I wish to remind Nigerians that constitution amendment alone, without attitudinal change on the part of every citizen, cannot guarantee democracy. Nor will constitutional amendment alone banish terrorism and insurgency, corruption, kidnapping, or the orgy of violence […]

Speaking in Asaba, Delta State Capital, during the retreat of the Senate Committee on Constitution Review, Mark said: “I wish to remind Nigerians that constitution amendment alone, without attitudinal change on the part of every citizen, cannot guarantee democracy. Nor will constitutional amendment alone banish terrorism and insurgency, corruption, kidnapping, or the orgy of violence presently ravaging the sinews of our corporate existence.

“Constitution review should therefore not be seen as an end in itself.  To run a democratic system successfully, the leaders and the led must show democratic impulses.  It is the cultural basis of the democratic project.

“The 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, which was bequeathed to us by the military, is far from being a perfect document. No plebiscite or referendum preceded its promulgation.  It is not surprising therefore that it contains a host of contradictions, lacunae and inconsistencies. These have engendered complaints from a cross section of Nigerians, and even from the executive branch of government.

“I urge that we jettison the holistic or wholesale approach.  Rather, attention should for now focus on those areas that compel urgent review.  Ours is a complex society in which the forging of a national consensus on borderline issues is an arduous, if not impossible, task”.

Earlier, the chairman of the committee and Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu, who assured that the new constitution would be ready by July 2013, disclosed that in addition to 56 requests for state creation, the committee had received 108 memoranda.

He urged Nigerians to avail themselves of the forthcoming public hearings to make inputs into the constitution review process, assuring that the committee would be “open and true to them”.