The Supreme Court of Nigeria on Thursday, October 26, affirmed the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s election as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
The Court dismissed Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Peter Obi of the Labour party (LP) appeals and declared that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) substantially complied with the Electoral Act 2022 and the Nigerian Constitution in the presidential election held on February 25.
In the wisdom of the Honourable Justices of the Supreme Court, the election cannot be nullified due to the unavailability of results on the INEC’s IReV portal, and that, failure to secure 25 percent of votes in Nigeria’s Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja was not compulsory. The Justices further stated that the petitioners didn’t prove allegations of rigging, adding that, the court was not disposed to the claims of APC’s double nomination of Kashim Shettima, the Vice-Presidential Candidate to President Tinubu. The attempt to file fresh evidence was frowned at and dismissed.
With this verdict, the eight months legal battle for the presidency came to an end, giving President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, APC and their supporters respite and the enabling environment to dispense governance by unleashing a programme of action for a united, secured and prosperous Nigeria.
There is no gain saying that Nigeria is in a parlous state, stunted in its overall administrative, security, political, socio-economic and infrastructural architecture. So, Mr. President has to roll up his sleeves or put the agbada aside and go to work to address these issues that have held the Nigerian state hostage.
There is the issue of interrogating the lingering ‘National Question’ – the restructuring of the country, popularly referred to as True Fiscal Federalism with devolution of powers properly spelt out between the federating units and the centre. These units should have absolute control and management of their variegated mineral and other resources for development at their own pace while competing favourably with each other and co-existing seamlessly with the central federal government; this time with lesser powers and control over the affairs of the federating units or states or geo-political zones as the case may be.
Then, there is the equally, if not more importantly, the issue of recrafting a new constitution which Nigerians can affirm to as their own document to replace the present 1999 Constitution dubbed by legal luminaries and critical stakeholders in the Nigerian project across the country, as fraudulent, unworkable and which has posed a serious threat to Nigeria’s peace, unity and progress.
It would be instructive to note that even in this hour of Nigeria’s new leadership in the person of a former NADECO chieftain, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, there are calls for government to promptly look into and address. One of such calls came recently through a widely publicised communique issued at the end of an extraordinary meeting of leaders of the Niger Delta region under the auspices of the Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), held in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, on Wednesday, October 25.
The highpoint of the communique, signed by Elder EK Clark, Nationalist and Niger Delta Leader, Chief Ayo Adebanjo (Afenifere Leader), Chief Dr Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, President-General, Ohaneze Ndigbo, Dr Pogu Britrus, President Middle Belt Forum, Senator Ibok-Essien, National Chairman, PANDEF and General Zamani Lekwork (rtd), former Military Governor of Rivers State, the leaders and elders discussed exhaustively the current developments in the country and urged the federal government to, “as a matter of urgency, and priority, work towards the restructuring of the country and enthrone true fiscal federalism as was originally entrenched in the 1960 and 1963 Constitutions”.
According to them, “without restructuring, the future of Nigeria and democracy remain weak and must, therefore, be carried out immediately.”
The ‘fact of the matter’ declaration by these patriots has, in itself, sufficiently given notice to President Tinubu’s administration that Nigeria cannot continue to be administered along the lines of a unitary system, with an over bloated centre, so powerful and all-consuming, that it leaves the federating units at the mercy of the federal government.
Where there is no equity and justice in the political and administrative landscape of Nigeria, the country and her people will continue to suffer under poor and evil leadership in the hands of the three most prominent arms of government – the executive, legislature and the judiciary. In the circumstance, the nation state, Nigeria, will continue to prop up rulers at every strata whose trade in stock is in the base exercise of kleptocracy or thievocracy; a government whose corrupt leaders use political power to expropriate the wealth of the people and land they govern, typically by embezzling or misappropriating government funds at the expense of the wider population. And there are too many examples of such in our public space in recent times.
The Tinubu administration, therefore, has a compelling duty to convene an urgent conference of some sort; call it national or ethnic, to quickly work out the modalities of such a congregation to address this all-important issue of the National Question.
We should stop burying our heads in the sand like the ostrich, preferring a peace-meal review of the 1999 Constitution by the National Assembly over the years; a situation which has done no good or justice to our country. The perpetuation of a skewed revenue allocation formula that robs Peter to pay Paul, and the control of mineral and other resources by the federal government to the disadvantage of states or geo-political zones, which own these resources, are yet other thorny issues to be solved by the Tinubu administration. Where is the equity? Where is the justice in the administration of the Nigerian state?
May the Tinubu presidency live to be remembered for turning the fierce currents of poverty and lack and unimaginative leadership around for the better in the country.
May the excruciating pain and burden brought upon Nigerians by corrupt, self-seeking and ostentatious administrations of the past be taken off the heavily burdened shoulders of Nigerians by Tinubu’s government.
May the expectant good governance of a Tinubu administration come with its attendant blessing and shine its glory on Nigeria and Nigerians to ease the sufferings of the people and usher in accelerated political, socio-economic and infrastructural transformation of the New Nigerian State.
•Ekiye, Publisher, writes from Yenagoa
