The other day, a friend argued that yours truly, who regularly quotes Nigeria’s Constitution, should initiate and lead a Society for the Study of Nigeria’s Constitution. The society, with members from all estates of the Nigerian realm, should constantly interrogate the Constitution to draw attention to its inadequacies.
Many state actors, especially in the executive and legislature of all tiers of government in Nigeria, regularly betray an abject lack of understanding of the Constitution in the discharge of their duties.
Recall the agony that Nigerians went through before somebody suggested the “doctrine of necessity” to break the constitutional logjam that emerged because of the unexpected death of former President Umaru Yar’Adua.
It took a yeoman’s effort before Vice President Goodluck Jonathan could emerge, first as Acting President, and finally as substantive President and Commander-in-Chief of Nigerian Armed Forces.
If somebody had interrogated the constitution earlier, anticipated such occurrence, raised the issue and insisted that appropriate action was taken, an appropriate clause would have been inserted in the Constitution.
Obafemi Awolowo, first Premier of Western Nigeria, and Bola Tinubu, former Governor of Lagos State, are two individuals who made it a point of duty to always test provisions of Nigeria’s Constitutions in the courts.
A slight detour here: As the Unitary Constitution of Nigeria, which is deceptively called Federal, includes names of capitals of local governments and of states, it will be impossible for a local government or state capital to relocate or be renamed.
Surprisingly, many of those calling for the restructuring of Nigeria do not even know the provisions of the Constitution and are, therefore, unable to identify sections that need to be reviewed, amended or excised to get the oppressors, who insist that Nigeria’s unity is not negotiable, to remove their knees from the neck of Nigeria.
Section 215(4) of Nigeria’s Constitution that requires that “before… (a) Commissioner of Police (carries out any instructions from a State Governor), the matter… (must be) referred to the President…” needs urgent review to restore peace and security to the nation.
American stand-up comedian, George Carlin, expressed the opinion that “Governments don’t want an intelligent population because people who can think critically can’t be ruled. They want a public just smart enough to pay taxes and dumb enough to keep voting and electing corrupt politicians.”
In other words, the political elite, rabid “gbajue” (or con artists), prefer to continuously keep the citizens ignorant of their rights and privileges, as they ride them roughshod.
This reminds one of President Kamuzu Banda, a medical doctor, who lived in England for more than 25 years, arguing that too many Malawians should not be exposed to Western education so that they do not become ungovernable!
As a “living organism,” the Constitution must constantly evolve and adapt to new situations for the benefit of the citizens. Irish playwright, George Bernard Shaw, says, “Progress is impossible without change.” And the law is made for man and not the other way.
That must be the reason for Section 9, the amendment clause of the Constitution, and the time-worn phrase, “As amended,” that lawyers repeat whenever they refer to the Constitution. It’s an acknowledgement that the Constitution may have been amended over time.
The Constitution of America has been amended nearly 30 times to reflect recent realities. The same reason explains the Constitution Amendment Conference convened by former President Goodluck Jonathan who, unfortunately, couldn’t muster the nerves to implement the recommendations.
Greek thinker, Heraclitus, says that change is the most permanent thing in nature. He argues that the same person cannot be dipped in flowing water twice. This is because the person and the water would have altered between the first and the second dip.
It must be because of the need to swiftly respond to circumstances that the people of Great Britain have an “Unwritten Constitution,” that is not compiled into one document but is rather a slew of written recommendations and unwritten practices and conventions that are called to use whenever the needs arose.
The take-home from the foregoing is the need to explain and popularise provisions of the Constitution so that both the leaders and the led will have a good understanding of the “manual” that is prescribed to run the Nigerian democracy.
It was Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a political philosopher, who suggested that the democracy and republicanism that the Americans opted to operate needed a highly literate citizenry. Otherwise it would be difficult to operate.
The same applies to the Nigerian version of democracy, whose practitioners seem to be out of their depth when they need to find the aspect of the Constitution that deals with the issues that they need solutions for.
You shouldn’t be too surprised to hear that many Nigerians are unaware of Sections 69 and 110, for instance, that allows them to recall or remove members of the National Assembly and State Houses of Assembly, if they can obtain the signatures of “more than half of those registered to vote in that member’s constituency alleging their loss of confidence in that member.
“(And after) a referendum is conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commision within ninety days of the date of receipt of the petition approved by a simple majority of the votes of the persons registered to vote in that member’s constituency.”
All they do is wring their fingers, lamenting as if it wasn’t their votes that got the members into the parliaments in the first place. Anyway, electorates who trade their votes for N500 or bowl of rice can never exercise the principle of recall on erring legislators.
Nigerians do not know that they could use the power of recall to compel legislators to amend Sections 65, 106, 131 and 177 of the Constitution so that independent candidates, and not only members nominated by political parties, can stand for election to political offices.
It is not for nothing that the cumbersome and unwieldy Section 9 of the Constitution prescribes a procedure for the amendment of the Constitution. This advantage must be taken at every opportunity.
They also do not know that they can use the power of recall to make legislators amend the ouster clause in Section 6(6)(c) that prevents the judiciary from compelling governments to comply with the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles enshrined in Chapter II of the Constitution for their good.
It is apposite to let you know the content of Chapter II of the Constitution which states the fundamental obligations of the government and the people. It also enumerates the political, economic, social, educational, foreign policy, environmental, cultural, scientific and technological ojectives of Nigeria.
And it states the duties of the citizens to Nigeria, the obligations of the mass media to hold government accountable to the people, Nigeria’s National Ethics of discipline, integrity, dignity of labour, social justice, religious tolerance, self reliance and patriotism.
Chapter II on Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles is supposed to be a social contract between the people and (especially the executive branch of) government and must be treated as if it were sacrosanct.
Indeed the entire Constitution is a comprehensive body of statutory laws that Nigerian citizens who, by the way, occupy the highest office in the land, have a right to expect politucians to observe both in letter and in spirit.
