FG and Concurrent Legislative list
It is incontrovertible that one of the factors that put Nigeria at the brink of a failed state is the willful bastardisation of the structure of Nigeria and the principles of federalism by successive military regimes and maintained by the civilian governments. Without the opinion and consent of other stakeholders, the military created more states, local governments and federal constituencies to enable a section have surplus and be better placed to have more statutory revenue allocations and majority votes in the national legislature.
Of course, there has been groundswell of discontent from other marginalised sections of the country on these critical factors in the governance of the country.
Those marginalized had hoped that with return of democratic governance, there would be proper restructuring to engender equity, justice and fair play. Unfortunately, the departing military oligarchy attached an apron string, which made it impossible for the emergent civilian government not to tamper with the lopsided political structures.
One of the crucial facts borne out of palpable ignorance of the concepts of governments like democracy, federal and unitary systems, was that these concepts have underlining principles which emanated from gathering of data, analysis and synthesis of data, hypothesis and theories. It stands to reason that when the underlining principles are applied in each case, the outcome is predictable; and when they are violated, the consequences become disastrous. This is the primary and proximate cause of Nigeria teetering at the brink of a failed state.
Nigeria’s founding fathers at independence were sufficiently aware of these underlining principles and consciously chose federal system of government based on land mass, diverse ethnic groups, cultures, religions and perception of life. Consequently, there was a true Federal/Republican Constitution with proper items in the legislative lists to enable the federating regional governments have a measure of autonomy to meet the yearnings and aspirations of their people for development.
There was healthy competition among the regional governments in development as each explored and exploited the vast mineral and natural resources within their respective areas and remitted an agreed sum to the federal government for the administration of foreign affairs, defense, immigration and customs.
It is lamentable that the federal government deliberately bastardised the Exclusive Legislative, Concurrent Legislative and Residual Legislative lists to pander to the vaulting ambition of a section of the country to lord it over the others. Centralized governance led to the intimidation of state governments over the items in the Concurrent Legislative list.
The federal government does not need to operate all the present MDA’s like agriculture, health, education, commerce and industry, prisons, solid minerals, power, housing works; and agencies such as FRSC which usurped the motor licensing, plate number and driving license from the board of internal revenues of state governments. That is why the Federal Ministry of Agriculture has become a tool of Fulani herdsmen, which is using impressing upon it to use public fund for importation of grasses, nutrients and other medicals; in addition to sponsoring a bill to develop the so-called “grazing reserves”. We are therefore calling for restructuring the country to reinvent true and fiscal federalism in order to put a stop to these aberrations.
