Prof. Onwuchekwa Jemie
Allow us to have fun Prof. Benjamin Obiefuna Nwabueze, one of many nice authorized minds of our era.
It’s tough to talk of Nwabueze besides in superlatives. His grounding was in constitutional legislation. He was a famend scholar, a college instructor and a mentor to many, a prolific creator of many books, an adviser to governments throughout the African continent, and a drafter of democratic constitutions.
The encomiums showered on Nwabueze from all sides are effectively deserved—and so are a few of the criticisms. Nwabueze was not a god with ft of clay. He was completely human, along with his full share of the positives and negatives to which all flesh is inheritor. And when it’s all added up, when his achievements are weighed towards his failings, he can be discovered to be an distinctive individual, a uncommon specimen of the human household.
Nwabueze’s most formidable undertaking was the drafting of the Nigerian Structure of 1979. Led by Chief Rotimi Williams, the nation’s then-leading identify within the authorized career, Prof. Nwabueze and the opposite eminences of the 1978-79 Structure Drafting Committee constructed what turned out to be an ill-conceived, ill-fitting American-style outfit which was draped over Nigeria because it tried to return to civilian rule after 13 years of navy dictatorship and civil conflict.
The purpose was admirable, however the methodology and the outcome have been dismal. All that the 1979 Structure did was to canonise the navy dictatorship then in observe, with all of the decentralised and reserved powers of the 4 Areas of the First Republic taken away and handed to a central, plenipotentiary civilian federal authorities.
The 1979 Structure was a boomerang. When its apparent defects have been noticed throughout the civilian authorities of Shehu Shagari, October 1, 1979 to December 31, 1983, discussions to amend it had hardly begun when one other navy coup blew every little thing to items. Then was to comply with 16 extra years of navy dictatorship. Nigeria whirled additional and quicker downhill until it hit backside with six years of Normal Sani Abacha, the worst of all of them.
Abacha’s sudden demise in 1998 introduced no aid. Quite the opposite, his henchman and successor dredged up the flawed 1979 Structure, transmogrified it a dozen-fold, and foisted it on the incoming civilian authorities because the 1999 Structure.
One may ask: The place was Prof. Nwabueze in all this drama?
It takes intelligence to understand one’s errors; humility to just accept them when identified by others; godliness to admit your errors publicly and settle for duty for them; and saintliness to brazenly and significantly interact to right your errors and undo the injury.
Prof. Nwabueze was one of many first to see the failings of the 1979 Structure. Listed here are his personal phrases in a newspaper interview:
“Fairly frankly, there are various flaws and lots of errors within the content material of the structure. So many errors, and I as an individual was partly accountable as a result of I used to be a member of the structure drafting committee arrange by the navy authorities in 1978. I used to be not solely a member however chairman of one of many sub-committees that produced Chapter 2, the basic goals and [principles of state policy]; and one of many cardinal flaws within the structure is the focus of powers within the centre.
“That’s the reason I settle for that I’m partly liable for that as a result of on the time, late Chief Rotimi Williams, a detailed pal of mine, and almost all people within the Structure Drafting Committee, have been so overwhelmed with this sense, this patriotic feeling that we would have liked unity and the simplest technique to obtain unity of the nation is by having a really robust central authorities.
“Most of us within the committee shared that concept on the time. Chief Williams shared it due to the patriotism in us and we wished a united Nigeria, we really feel we will obtain unity by having a robust central authorities. Then, what did we do to attain our mis-guided goal? We took away 50 per cent of the objects on the concurrent checklist and gave it to the centre.
“We really feel by doing this, we’re establishing unity. We didn’t cease at that. We regarded on the residual issues, these are issues unique to the states, we took a big a part of it, greater than 30 % and near 50 %; we took it away from states and gave to the centre. And the result’s the almighty Federal Authorities, however what we uncover was that as an alternative of manufacturing unity, we produced disunity due to the depth of the wrestle to regulate the centre.
“The depth is a lot and it’s not simply within the political energy that was concentrated on the centre, a lot of the cash additionally went to the centre, and so by motion we destroyed what known as fiscal federalism. An excessive amount of cash on the centre elevated the wrestle for the management of the centre and the management of the cash itself, and that has remained the function of the Structure up until in the present day.
“So when folks wrestle and agitate for true federalism, for fiscal federalism, they know what they’re speaking about and they’re proper, that have to be modified; and till it’s modified, we would not obtain true federalism as a result of the idea on which we did it has proved to be misguided, the unity we thought we are going to obtain was not achieved and what we achieved was extra disunity than unity due to the wrestle. . . .
“So not solely restructuring in political energy, not solely restructuring in monetary energy, it’s important to restructure the territorial foundation of zones. . . .”
And so, the 1979 Structure was Nwabueze’s best undertaking but additionally a cataclysmic failure, and his deepest remorse. His efforts to right that mistake and make amends to the nation got here to nought. In his personal voice, and within the voice of The Patriots, the activist group which he co-founded, Nwabueze repeatedly known as for a Convention of the Nigerian Nationalities to put in writing a brand new Structure and restructure the territory in a approach that displays the need of the Folks. When ultimately President Goodluck Jonathan organized such a Convention in 2014, his successor in 2015 paid no heed in any respect to its suggestions. Nigerians can choose for themselves in what route the nation travelled in his successor’s eight years in workplace.
The wrestle for restructuring and a brand new Structure continues.
For Nwabueze, it’s lights out.
Good night time, Sir.
And will the Good Lord who made us all and sees each coronary heart, forgive you your sins, look kindly in your efforts to make amends to your errors, and grant you relaxation in His Heavenly Kingdom.
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*Prof. Onwuchekwa Jemie was a co-founder of The Guadian Newspaper, and its pioneer Editorial Web page Editor. He was additionally Editor-in-Chief of BusinessDay Newspaper.
