*Submits document to NASS
The Movement for National Reformation (MNR) has called for a return to Nigeria’s Republican Constitution of 1963.
The group noted that the constitution was a veritable cure to the country’s defective federal system and best democratic approach to constitutional review.
The group said it is canvassing that position as part of its contribution to the ongoing national discourse on the restructuring of Nigeria, stressing that the 1963 constitution offers clarity to the seeming confusion by the members of the National Assembly.
In a statement at the weekend jointly signed by the Chairman of MNR Constitution Review Committee, Prof. Igho Natufe and Secretary, Dr. Yemi Adekoke, the group said it has already submitted a memoranda calling for a return to the 1963 Constitution to both the Senate and House of Representatives.
While arguing that it was unclear what the Senate Leader, Opayemi Bamidele meant when he “assured Nigerians that the issue of regionalism was not part of the ongoing constitution review,” MNR said he got it all wrong.
The statement said: “For the Senate Leader to suggest that regionalism will encourage Biafran secessionism reveals a poor understanding of the value of regionalism in maintaining stability in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious polity like Nigeria.
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“On the contrary, a denial of regionalism will encourage the emergence of centrifugal forces with severe consequences for the political system. If Nigerians are sincere in their desire for ‘restructuring’, it is vital that they embrace regionalism as a vibrant ideological principle in the articulation of federalism.”
MNR argued that the 1963 CFRN is the only existing federal constitution in Nigeria Nigeria that emerged through a bottom-top process that fits the mantra of “We the People” in its preamble.
It stressed that the 1963 Republican constitution was only suspended, but was never abrogated, noting that civil governance in the first republic was truncated in January 1966.
“Since the collapse of the First Republic on January 15, 1966, constitution making in Nigeria has deviated from the universally accepted principle of the federating units negotiating and agreeing on the terms of federalism,” the statement added.