By Segun Ayobolu
Beyond its effects on public health strategies, economic management policies as well as attitudes towards poverty alleviation and social inequality, the raging coronavirus pandemic will also have profound implications for our perception and management of intergovernmental relations particularly in a federal polity.
In Nigeria, much of the discourse on federalism and intergovernmental relations especially in the media tends to see both as exclusively matters of constitutionalism, legality and institutional structures.
Most advocates of what they perceive and describe as ‘true federalism’ in Nigeria, for instance, have a particular ideal construct of federalism in mind, most often the American variant, to which they believe Nigeria must conform.
The popular notion of ‘true federalism’ in Nigeria appears to be influenced by the famous depiction of federalism by Professor K.C. Wheare as a constitutional arrangement in which you who have at least two levels of government ‘which are equal and coordinate in their respective spheres of influence’.
According to Wheare, “The terms of agreement which establishes the general and regional governments and distributes powers between them must be (supreme and) binding upon these governments”.
Thus, from this perspective, the American system in which the states are perceived as largely autonomous of the centre with a wide latitude of discretionary constitutional action as well as control of powers, responsibilities and resources is the ideal to which over-centralized ‘federal structures’ like Nigeria must seek to approximate.
Nigeria’s federalism, widely perceived as essentially unitary, is heavily criticized as concentrating too much power, resources and responsibilities in the centre and thus constricting the creative capacities and developmental potentials of the sub-national units of government. There is much that is valid in this point of view but it can also be an argument taken too far.
Serious scholars of federalism have always taken into account the dynamic and ever changing contexts within which federal polities operate and evolve. Thus, in his classic, ‘Federalism in Nigeria’, published over three decades ago, Professor Sam Oyovbaire, conceptualizes federalism in America in dynamic and evolutionary rather than unchanging and inflexible structural terms.
He identifies as at that time at least five different phases in the unfolding of federal practice in the United States with constantly shifting emphases in the distribution of power, resources and influence between the federating entities.
In the words of Oyovbaire, which I find even more pertinent today given the implications of handling the coronavirus pandemic for intergovernmental relations in the United States and Nigeria: “The perspective of federalism as a static and rigid pattern characterized by a triple division of legal status, structured institutions and functions between two governmental levels has been transformed into a system which allows the exercise of political discretions by two levels of government in working out joint policies over joint problems”.
The political scientist continues, “The new federalism is a political expedient and unlike ‘old style federalism’, which presupposes mainly competitive relationship between the two levels, it presupposes both conflict and consensus and a common interest in available resources as embedded in intergovernmental relationship.
The outcome of this relationship is the power of each government. The prime movers and arbiters of the new federalism are thus politics and their environment, not law and constitutionality per se”.
These words read as if they were written yesterday not some 35 years ago. Contrary to the popular perception of the states as largely fiscally autonomous and self-sustaining in the United States, we have seen states crying desperately for federal aid – financial, material and logistical – in combating the COVID-19 disease in their respective jurisdictions. The lesson is that no component part can be an island unto itself in a federal polity.
Thus, the case for considerably devolving more powers, responsibilities and resources to the sub-national levels of government in Nigeria, though logically and empirically impeccable, must not be to the extent of weakening the federal government to a level of operational and functional inefficacy.
It is instructive that, though the states are heavily dependent on federal assistance in responding effectively to the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, governors have pushed back strongly against actions by President Donald Trump perceived as eroding the sphere of state authority.
Thus, when Trump mulled the idea of enforcing quarantine in certain hard hit states such as New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo was of the view that it “would be a federal declaration of war against the states”.
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At the end of the day, Trump allowed each state to follow its own line of action in responding to the pandemic not because he did not have sufficient powers to declare a national lockdown, in my view, but because he is personally disposed to the country coming quickly out of the recessionary restrictions and get the economy working again.
Critics of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus crisis have condemned what they see as lackluster federal leadership, with a number of states still refraining from restrictive initiatives despite the toll of the pandemic on the citizenry.
In the same vein, Trump had to back down on his earlier claim to having ‘total authority’ on the processes for opening up the social and economic spaces across the country with the federal government now simply drawing up broad guidelines that states must adhere to in gradually restoring normalcy in their respective jurisdictions.
At the end of the day, it is not strictly constitutional and legal issues that are at play in the intergovernmental handling of the coronavirus crisis in the United States but a complex interplay of dynamic forces including inter personal relations, institutional capacity, environmental peculiarities, party politics as well as ideology among others.
The critical point is that intergovernmental cooperation and coordination is indispensable to the efficient and effective functioning of federal systems.
In Nigeria, constitutional issues were raised in a number of quarters when President Muhamamdu Buhari in his March 29th address to the nation announced a restriction of movement in Lagos and Ogun states as well as the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja for two weeks in the first instance to contain the spread of the virus in these three most vulnerable areas.
While Buhari later predicated the legality of his action on the Quarantine Act, it is instructive that the Ogun State government had to consult with the federal authorities to ensure that the presidential directive came into effect only four days after it was due to start.
And both Lagos and Ogun states have introduced measures peculiar to their respective environments in implementing the presidential directive in their jurisdictions.
The arrest by the Rivers State governor, Mr Nyesom Wike, of the pilots, crew and passengers of the Caverton Helicopter that flew into the state despite the lockdown imposed by the state government is an example of adversarial intergovernmental relations in responding to the crisis.
Although the Minister of Aviation, Alhaji Hadi Sirika, contended that Aviation matters is on the exclusive list and that the Federal Government acted within its competence and in the national interest by approving the aircraft’s flight to Port Harcourt, it is noteworthy that the federal government did not resort to federal might to address the situation.
Rather, the Rivers State government charged the affected persons to court and they were ultimately released on bail through due judicial process. Proper communication and coordination between the federal and Rivers State authorities would surely have averted the avoidable and distracting crisis.
Overall, intergovernmental relations in responding to the coronavirus pandemic in Nigeria have been harmonious, effective and productive. This has been so particularly between the Federal and the Lagos State governments.
There is no doubt that the federal government itself will benefit from a deepening of Nigeria’s federal practice such that the centre becomes leaner, smarter and thus more effective and efficient while the sub-national governments are ceded greater powers, responsibilities and resources to more positively impact the lives of those who reside in their territories.
However, a cardinal lesson of the coronavirus pandemic is that restructuring must no longer be articulated as intended to weaken the capacity of the federal government as the central authority. A strong centre capable of playing its role effectively is as critical to the health and well being of the federation as fiscally, economically and operationally viable sub-national governments.
For, as the prophetic and far sighted Chief Obafemi Awolowo declared in a speech to the Conference of Finance Commissioners in Kano on 23rd Februaray 1970, “…But if perchance, any State fell on an evil day, it should be the duty of the Federal Government, acting as the accredited agent of all the other states, to come to the aid of such a needy State without delay.
To this end, the Federal Government should be provided with enough funds. It will not be easy in the beginning to estimate how much this will be. But as time goes on, experience will guide us”.
This view is even more prescient in today’s age of unanticipated and unpredictable national and global emergencies.
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