Our Constitution Is Fatally Flawed In Some Provisions – Oby Ezekwesili

Posted by Thandiubani on Fri 16th Aug, 2024 - tori.ng

She stated this on Thursday while speaking with Arise TV Charles Aniagolu. Ezekwesili argued that the country may not reach its full potential with the current constitution.

A former Minister of Education, Obiageli Ezekwesili has called for a change of Nigeria's constitution.

According to the politician, some provisions of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution (as amended) are fatally flawed.

Mrs. Oby Ezekwesili said there is lopsidedness of centralization in the Constitution. She advised the National Assembly to stop the amendment of some sections of the constitution but initiate a process for a new constitution.

The founder of School of Politics, Policy, and Governance said the country has yet to achieve potential as a great nation because of the flaws in the constitution.

She stated this on Thursday while speaking with Arise TV Charles Aniagolu. Ezekwesili argued that the country may not reach its full potential with the current constitution.

The former minister said, “There was no need to continue to tinker on the margins of this Constitution.

“It is fatally flawed in some of the provisions where there’s a lopsidedness of centralization. The centralized approach to solving problems that can be solved at decentralized and disaggregated basis is a nightmare for performance.

“It is a nightmare for optimization in the use of scarce resources. So we said, stop tinkering on the margin. You can do something different to move the society toward this kind of a national conversation backed by law that then leads toward a set of issues that we are solving for because your Constitution has to be solving for something.

“In that process, what you should do is a single-issue amendment. Do a single-issue amendment of the Constitution to allow for the process that leads to a constitutional-making approach that is representative of the various layers and levels of the issues and the factors that are creating the biggest bottleneck to Nigeria’s greatness.

“Now, if we want to be a really great country, we have to envision how to be that. The Constitution that comes out of that process would be a Constitution that amalgamates the wills that that is possible.

“And that comes from a very thorough process and rigorous process of conversations on how countries have solved certain problems that were still stuck at the bottom trying to solve.

“So we said do a single-issue amendment and then allow for a referendum as part of that single-issue amendment that opens up the space for a different approach than what they are doing.

“But then the evidence that we see, whether it’s in terms of the political dysfunction of Nigeria, as we see it today, or the social collapse of cohesion and capital, or it is in terms of economic paralysis that is not leading to the kind of structural change that can transform and make this society a society that enables those with the possibilities to be great, to become great.”