BEVERLY HILLS, August 18, (THEWILL) – The immediate past governor of Ondo state, Olusegun Mimiko, on Thursday pointed out that Nigeria is a country on the edge, fearing that what would become of Nigeria on October 1 is still uncertain.
This was as he joined former minister of Information, Labaran Maku, and southern leaders to reach a consensus on the restructuring of the country, clarifying that restructuring is not about the South being against the North.
THEWILL recalls that a coalition of northern youths had declared in Kaduna that the Igbo should be out of the North by October 1. Since then, there have been counter ultimatums from other parts of the country asking citizens to vacate by October 1, which is Nigeria’s Independence anniversary.
At a colloquium attended by prominent leaders in the South-West, South-East, South-South and the North, Mimiko said, “The country is on a precipice. No one can predict what will happen on October 1. Any country that cannot boast of security for its citizens and property is not worthy of being called a country.
According to him, “Restructuring is decentralising power to make a way from distribution and consuming arrangement for every federating units to increase its fiscal resources for development.
“We need to have state and local police to protect the lives of citizens and property. The ruling party has said voters should not vote for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2019 because of restructuring, so we are now watching to see whether the All Progressives Congress (APC) will restructure before 2019.”
On his part, Maku said, “Nigeria needs restructuring. It offers Africa and Africans a great hope if we can reform the structure and its internal powers. The majority of us believe that restructuring will make Nigeria a great country, and these kind of debates are needed to ensure that restructuring works.”
Niger Delta activist, Annkio Briggs, who was one of the discussants at the event themed: ‘Restructuring: Challenges, implications and the way forward’, stated that she has the mandate of the Niger Delta people to speak on their behalf, warning that if the country does not restructure, there would not be elections in 2019.
“The country is like a moving train without brakes and in order not to crash, we need to restructure. All regions must come together and agree on restructuring and everybody must say what restructuring means to them, and we must agree on restructuring before 2019 election. There is so much injustice in the country.
“For instance, there are 419 local governments in the North and 365 local government in the South and the north gets far more resources from the Federal Government than the people producing oil in the country. Niger Delta is producing more and getting less.
“We must have a new constitution or we can use the 1963 constitution and work on it. We can have a new constitution that will take care of these injustices like the issue of Fulani herdsmen and religion. If we cannot restructure, we should call the zones together to call for a referendum, so that each zone can determine how they want to live.”
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