‘Why I support tenure extension’

You are one the veterans of constitutional conferences. What do you think of this conference?I am one of the many or few who ardently called for this conference. In Uyo when we were on a political summit, I wrote a committed, passionate appeal to Nigerians to pressure Mr. President to recognize himself as the focal […]

You are one the veterans of constitutional conferences. What do you think of this conference?
I am one of the many or few who ardently called for this conference. In Uyo when we were on a political summit, I wrote a committed, passionate appeal to Nigerians to pressure Mr. President to recognize himself as the focal point of the people’s sovereignty and convoke this conference. It wasn’t two months after that that the conference was convoked.  But the principal reason it happened so fast is that we found David Mark, the Senate President supporting the same thing.
Why does anybody call for this conference?  Only so that we can have Nigeria as a permanent feature in this world. We don’t want the breakup of this country. I love Nigeria passionately and when I say things as they are, some people in this country think I am working against them. When I say things as they are, many of my friends from the north begin to say I am turning an enemy but you see if we don’t change things, we can’t have Nigeria as a permanent feature of the world. So, what this conference is about is ensuring the permanence of one Nigeria.
You said when you say things as they are, your friends, especially from the north misconstrue you. What are these things that you say?
You see, the Generals were mostly from the north. They restructured Nigeria. From making it 12 states to making it 19 states to 21 states to 30 states to 36 states was the work of northern generals. In this process, one zone, the Northwest has 7 states. One zone, the Southeast has five states. In the process, Kano and Jigawa have more local government than the entire Southeast; it is not a matter of geographical mass; no. Governance is about the welfare of the masses, the person, and not square miles. But because they were in power, they favoured their places causing structural imbalance in Nigeria. When I was governor, Babangida in his government wanted us to give phrases to describe our various states; Edo said the state is heart of the nation. I called Anambra home for all. Now it has been changed to Light of the nation, it is alright, I prefer home for all because we from Anambra make home everywhere and our own home should be for all.
That psychosis of Born to rule is what is killing Nigeria now; from there we have found opposition to Jonathan as candidate for PDP, from there Buhari contested for President and Buhari told his supporters and everybody that he must win; if he doesn’t win, it must be rigging.
People are talking about single term for political office holders…
(Cuts in)…I believe in single term for political office holders because it is more efficient. If you go there, you want your name to be immortalized. You work without people harassing you, without going for second term and bribing left and right and killing people even. Six years is alright.
Some people say it is a ploy by especially some parts of the south to elongate president Jonathan’s tenure
Okay, that does not make sense but I can give credit to people that look far in the future. Now, the possibility they are referring to may be my own papers where I said between this National Conference and 2015 election there may be a clash and what do we do if there is a clash?  For me as an individual, I will have no qualms allowing incumbent office bearers to stay one more year or even two in order to get the country properly planned, a constitution that will lead us to where we want to go instead of rushing to crises 2015 election.