Being text of the paper presented by Professor Ukachukwu A. Awuzie (KSM), Guest Speaker, at the Maiden Edition of Ralph Opara Memorial Lecture organised by the National Association Of Seadogs (a.k.a Pyrates Confraternity) Imo State Chapter at Owerri, Imo State, Nigeria – 7th, September 2004.
Distinguished Chairman, Dr. Tony Iredia,
Director-General, Nigerian Television Authority,
The Keynote Speaker, Dr. Eddie Iroh,
DG Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria,
The Special Guest of Honour, Alhaji Idi Farouk,
DG, National Orientation Agency,
The NAS Capoon,
The Present and Past Capoons of the various Decks, here present,
The President, NAS Imo State,
My Lords Spiritual and Temporal,
Distinguished Members of the Association,
Gentlemen of the Press,
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Preamble:
I consider it a wonderful privilege, honour and opportunity to be invited by the National Association Seadogs, Imo State Chapter, as a Guest Speaker at the Maiden Edition of Ralph Opara Memorial Lecture.
Let me confess that I was surprised when I received the invitation and hence asked myself why I was chosen for this arduous task of delivering a lecture in honour of this great Colossus of our time, this great broadcaster, this great administrator and this mobiliser of men and resources for the greater good of our nation and humanity at large. I was even more overwhelmed when I realized that no topic had been selected for me for discussion. I was therefore confused, more so when I knew little or nothing about the Association, nor had an intimate knowledge or relationship with the great man, Ralph Opara on whose memory this lecture is being organized. I therefore set out to do some basic research on the National Association of Seadogs and was moved by their Four Cardinal Points which are itemized as “Against Moribund Convention; Against Tribalism; For Humanistic Ideals and For Comradeship and Chivalry”. Reading further, I found that these seemed to tally with the ideals enshrined in the Four-Way Test of Rotary Club about what we think, say or do and also itemized thus:
(1) Is it the truth?
(2) Is it fair to all concerned?
(3) Will it build good will and better friendship? And
(4) Will it be beneficial to all concerned?
Going further into the four cardinal points of the Association, I was convinced that as far back as 1952 when seven wise men including our late Ralph Opara enunciated these ideals, that if the larger society of Nigeria had imbibed them, we would have had by now a better Nigeria and most of the ills plaguing the nation today would have been solved. I was convinced within myself that these great men did through their motto set the nation on the path of stability and development.
Unfortunately, they were either ignored or called names and hence the derailment, which they noticed and which motivated them to found the Confraternity, continued unabated. Like a train that had left its track, there was need to re-engineer it back onto the track. This was the basis for my choice of the lecture title, “Re-engineering the Nigerian Democratic Experiment for Stability and Development.”
Having established the basis for the lecture title, may I do one of two things. Let me first and foremost commend the organizers of this Maiden “Ralph Opara Memorial Lecture” for their vision, mission and true spirit of comradeship. For by this act they have begun in its truest sense the journey towards the immortalization of the name of this true son of Nigeria, this patriot and visioner. This is doing honour to whom honour is due both in life and in death. May you be remembered hereafter for your good works and deeds!
Secondly, may I present a format for addressing the subject matter which first, examines these four cardinal points of the Association which late Ralph Opara helped to formulate and find out how the Nigerian nation under democracy or military dictatorship deviated from them, establish the causes of our present derailment and how the present democratic experiment is continuing to exacerbate rather than curtail this derailment. The paper will then suggest ways in which the democratic experiment can be made sustainable and a better future created for Nigerians and the polity.
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RELEVANT INFORMATION ON THE ASSOCIATION’S EFFORT TO ENGINEER A GOOD SOCIETY
Action they say, speak louder than words. It is therefore on that premise that this author is convinced that the vision of the late Ralph Opara for society and humanity and for engineering a humane, free and egalitarian society for Nigeria can best be captured and appreciated through the examination of the genesis and motto of the Association which he helped to found. In order to do this I have had to draw copiously from the National Association of Seadogs’ Handbook.
In tracing the genesis of the Association, the Handbook states: “The 1950’s also marked a heightening of the nationalist movement and the sad recourse to tribal alignments in the country. Quick, as always to absorb the worst tendencies of many national movements, the University College, Ibadan, itself became a breeding ground for the worst kind of tribal thinking clubs, the Students Representative Council, all forms of student activity, including sports, became mere expressions of tribal pettiness”.
“It was against this background and to combat these negative tendencies that seven students, including the man in whose memory this lecture is being organized, founded the Pyrates Confraternity in 1952”.
In enunciating their philosophy and customs, the Pyrates creed reads: “The piratical aims of fighting all social ills and conformist degradation within and outside our midst stand supreme. These are translated into the creed, which is supposed to act as a guide to our acts and thoughts and to the solutions to dilemmas that may face us in making choices in life. The organisation in order to achieve this adopted what it calls the four compass points whose function is to give us founding principles upon which to direct our lives.”
It is perhaps necessary to list the content of these four cardinal points as they formed the foundation for achieving the goals of the Association and for creating a Nigeria of their dream.
- Against Convention: Which it sees as meaning complacency, conservation and stagnation and hence anti-initiative, anti-imagination and anti-creativity. It argues under this that statement as “this is how our fathers used to do it” is the unthinking excuse of the lazy, unadventurous mind “and that ii is under this term convention that we hid such acts as bribery or ‘cola’ land grabbing…” Here the Organisation raises the banner of revitalization.
- Against Tribalism: This, according to the Organisation “goes under the camouflage of the party system. It holds that whatever party – Partisanship – Tribalism – Clannishness – Statism – Atavism and all other forms of narrow throwbackism.” It urges Nigerians to “fight it” stand outside it as an independent unit and march with ideas that cut across petty alliances.”
- Humanistic Ideals: No Slave to Dogma: Simply placing man at the center of word, thought and deed. Thinking and acting for the community of man – village, city, school, college, nation, continent-wide. Refuse to be blinded by slogans, dissecting what are hidden behind seductive formulae. Asking instead: What’s in it for man and the community of his kind? Ask what you can do to raise that community to the highest level of fulfillment.” One may then ask whether we are raising these questions in our new democratic experiment.
- For Comradeship and Chivalry: it means according to the Organisation, “that sense of obligation, moral, communal, humane which makes the strong, the privileged, the informed protect the weak, the underprivileged, and the uninformed. It should not be “my Mercedes is bigger than yours, so get out of my way; I control a student or national journal or media outfit, show me fear or I will libel you with my fantasies”. Rather answer, “only pygmies need puffing; only dwarfs need platforms.” Comradeship and chivalry reject; “to him who hath, more will be given and proclaim instead, to whom who hath not, all shall be provided”. Thus we move to destroy elitism. (From NAS web site, Home page 13th July 2004).
Summarizing the four cardinal points of the National Association of Seadogs for which the Ralph Opara, was a foundation member, one could not but come to a logical conclusion that these great sons of Nigeria were motivated to found this organisation in order to ensure peace, stability, good governance, justice and fair play and to eradicate all vistages of self centredness, greed, avarice, clannishness. It was aimed at guaranteeing that players in the political arena in the country work not for self aggrandizement and personal wealth but for service to humanity, for the upliftment of the economic and social well being of not only the rich but also the poor, the underprivileged and indeed the masses of the nation.
The author is of the opinion that the only way these noble ideals can be achieved and sustained is through the enthronement of social justice and the rule of law in every aspect of the national endeavour and that the operators of the current political/democratic experiment can help us achieve these goals. For that reason permit me to briefly discuss social justice and the rule of law and how their negligence in the past has led to the numerous problems and conflicts that had bedeviled the nation and resulted in the stopping of true democracy; stability and the development of the nation.
Peace and Stability:
The present “democratic” government in Nigeria has inundated the populace with the impression that its greatest achievement in the last five years has been the achievement of peace and stability. Perhaps these two terms have been so used as to create confusion in the minds of the people on the true meaning of the word peace and stability, and this has compelled the author to go into search for the true meaning of stability and peace particularly with recent communal, ethnic and religious crises that have plagued and continued to plague the nation.
Stability:
Stability can only thrive in the atmosphere of peace (Eddie Iroh) and peace has been defined by Dr. A. Aderionye, a Consultant to UNESCO as “not just non-occurrence of violence and open existence of tolerance”. He regarded peace as a culture and went further to elaborate: the culture of peace is a culture of freedom, universal respect, upholding of human rights, elimination of double standards, appreciation of the other, complete refusal of dominance, exploitation, discrimination in all human endeavours.” Achievement of all these is possible only if there is social justice – which calls for fair play, equity and equality before the law. Eddie Iroh argues however that “Justice in its abstract form is really a nebulous concept that has long defied clear definition and that perhaps the closest definition that tried to put flesh on the dry bone were those by Lord Denning, the celebrated English Jurist; L.D. Carzon and Justice Chukwudifu Oputa who in different writing summarized justice either;
- as “giving everyone his due” and ensuring that when justice is done, no person wins or loses, only justice wins; or
- as “the application of laws as opposed to arbitrariness”;
- (Carzon) or viewing from administrative perspective by stating that, “the court exists to do justice to all manner of men without fear or favour, affection or ill-mind towards anybody and without distinction or discrimination, as to class or social status…”(Oputa)
According to Eddie Iroh in his pre-convocation lecture, “Justice and fair play are Siamese twins” to which the author adds: and the ingredient and foundation stone for building a stable society and for the formulation of humane development policies and programmes.
It is therefore right to state that any attempt at forging a united nation and achieving sustainable democracy must first of all address all vistages of social injustice that exist in the nation which include dominance of the Nigerian political landscape by covert or overt arrangement between serving and retired military officers; the state structure, the local government structure, the structure and composition of armed forces; revenue derivation/allocation formula, the national economy, corruption, presidency of the nation and governance.
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The Emergence and Dominance of the Nigerian Political Landscape
The emergence of the Army in Nigeria’s political landscape gave rise to the enthronement of education-phobia and social injustice in the Nigerian polity. The Army under Major General Aguiyi Ironsi introduced the Unitary system of government that killed initiatives and the quasi autonomy enjoyed by the regions, while Gowon’s 12 states structure was the first clearly conceived step to publicly adopt the divide and rule system as a way of perpetuating some class interest and of entrenching structural imbalance in the Nigerian geopolity. The numerical balance of six for North and South was dubious in concept and calculated to ensure that political power was rested permanently in the North.
Under the new Federal structure of 12 states, the East had three states of Rivers, East Central for all the Igbo speaking people of the East, and Cross Rivers. Here the minorities had two states and the majority tribe in the old Eastern Region had only one state. This arrangement defied the provincial structure that existed in the region at the dawn of independence. Western region had two states of Lagos and Western region while the old North had six states. By this arrangement the political balance had been tilted. The regime that took over from Gowon and led by Murtala Muhammed and Obasanjo, in response to the agitation for the creation of more states raised the number to 19 by creating 7 additional states. It was at this point that the calculated effort to ensure that the number of states from the Northern Region was made more than those from the former Southern Regions of East, West and Mid West materialized. Further adjustment brought it to 21 with North having 11 and the South 10; then to 30 with the North controlling 16 states and the South 14. The Abacha regime consolidated the imbalance through his government six-zone structure and added one state more to each zone, bringing the total number to 36 and the Federal Capital Territory. The problem with this creation is that it was based on spurious considerations and its use as basis for sharing political appointments and revenue, institutionalized injustice in the polity. For example, in the state structure, it is seen that all the zones minus the South East, have 6 or more states. The implication is that the Igbo nationality that once formed one of the legs of the Nigerian political tripod got reduced to a minority zone in the federation; what with only 15 Senators out of the 109 in the nation. This makes the Igbos control only 13% of the political power in the Senate, the post of Senate President not withstanding. It brings with it economic marginalization of the area since the current revenue formula stipulates that about 50% of national revenue allocation to states be shared on equality of states. Hence the Igbo nationality total taking from this came to approximately 14% despite its population that is put at about 25% of the national population.
Local Government Creation
The greatest social injustice in the nation was committed in the creation of local government and the delineation of federal constituencies. For example, in the creation of states by Babangida regime, the old Kano State had 45 local government areas. Jigawa State was carved out of this State. Under Abacha’s adjustment of local government areas and creation of states, Kano State was given 44 local government areas and Jigawa 28 bringing the total for the old Kano State to 72 local government areas. For the Igbo nationality of South East zone, the picture is Imo 27, Anambra 21, Ebonyi 13, Abia 17 and Enugu 17 totalling 95. In terms of Federal constituencies, Kano has 24 and Jigawa 10 totalling 34 while Imo has 10, Enugu 10, Abia 8, Ebonyi 7 and Anambra 10 totalling 45. In effect, in terms of revenue sharing (50% on equality of LGA’s) and representation in the Federal House of Representatives, the 5 states of the South-East compare with only the old Kano State. This imbalance and social injustice has serious economic and social and development implication for the zone. It is on record that old Kano and Sokoto Emirates control 1/3 of all the local government areas in the country. It is also an act of social injustice hat Lagos with a population of over 12 million people has 10 seats in the House of Representatives as against Kano with about 7million people and 24 members of the House of Representatives. This perhaps justifies Lagos State insistence on the creation of additional local government areas within its area of jurisdiction.
The Armed Forces
With the crises preceding the civil war, most Easterners in the forces, were forced to return to the East. At the end of the war, even though there was a proclamation of no victor, no vanquished, most of these returnees were never reabsorbed and those retained thereafter have found it hard to rise to commanding positions in these forces. In fact under Abacha’s regime only 3 out of the 36 Police Commissioners manning states in the Federation came from the east. The story has not been different in the other sectors of the Nigerian Armed Forces.
Social injustice is also glaring in the portfolios assigned to Ministers from the Igbo speaking States. For example, while it has become the fortune of the Igbos to produce for most of the time the Minister of Information/Noise making, they have never been opportuned to produce the Minister of Internal Affairs and Defence either under military or civilian dispensation. The distributions of Permanent Secretaries and Chairmen of Boards of Federal Parastatals and Corporations have followed the same pattern. It is for this that in a paper delivered in 1998; Dim Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, Ikemba Nnewi in bemoaning what he saw as entrenched forms of marginalization and subjugation of Ndigbo declared that “without addressing these issues, the nation’s effort at peace would amount to reconciliation without repair.” Eddie Iroh (2004) argued that the relentless call from some quarters for a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) arise because of the need to address these issue of injustices and inequalities”. This he elaborated by stating that a National Conference was held in 1950 when all the regions had opportunity to state their claims and conditions for continuing to be part of the Federation and that today the terms of reference suggested by the proponents of the SNC are very much the same as those proposed 54 years ago and they include:
- Redistribution of the nation’s resources via a new revenue allocation formula.
- The recognition of the rights of oil producing states otherwise referred to as Resource Control to redress what Niger Delta youth refer to as our oil and their money.
- Marginalization otherwise known as relative deprivation.
- Ethnicity.
- Rotational Presidency (Power sharing)
- Religious Freedom
- All the above, as road map to true federalism.
If these issues were discussed then and Nigeria remained united thereafter, one then wonders why people are opposed to it now considering that, that Conference must have been motivated by the fear of possible social injustice and inequalities that might bedevil the nation at independence and hamper stability and development in an independent Nigeria. Perhaps one might argue that the opponents of SNC are more motivated by selfish considerations as they are those reaping from the social injustice and inequalities that exist in the nation. Their argument that there cannot be a Sovereign National Conference when there is a bunch of “self imposed” Representatives of the people in the National Assembly and the respective Executive and Legislative arms of government is a non-issue, as the present government has proved itself in the last four years as being incapable of redressing these problems. One had thought that our concern should be on how to elect/appoint representatives to this Conference and the author believes that Nigerians being a creative people, if tasked, will find a workable solution to the issue of representation. Our people should be reminded that the word sovereign does not apply to sovereignty of state but to the fact that the product of this Conference shall not be open to further tinkering by a bunch of selfish men and women that parade the present corridors of power/government. The continued agitation for Sovereign National Conference now is heightened by the nature of governance being experienced, which has negated the basic principles of democracy, true federalism, justice, rule of law and has been characterized by lopsidedness in terms of government developmental activities and squandermania. It is clear that in the last five years of PDP government, no single federal road has either been fully rehabilitated or constructed in the former Eastern region. For that reason it is necessary to discuss governance.
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Governance and Agitation for Rotational Presidency:
Joan Crockery, Anthony Lord and Denis Oshorne in their separate writings agreed in defining Governance as the process by which “diverse elements in a society wield power and influence … enacts policies and decision concerning public life, economic and societal development.”
The increasing recognition of governance as a necessary condition for sustainable development reflects the lessons learned from failures of past experiments (Eddie Iroh). Thus emphasis here should be on good governance, one that reflects democratic and egalitarian conditions, and enables society to achieve peace, stability and development and not necessarily on which ethnic group occupies the exalted position of the President or Governor of the nation or state. It has to be stated that the attributes of good governance according to Human Society and Global Governance include the four freedoms. They are freedom from fear and want (the cause for the present struggle by the ethnic groups for the Conference and for the Presidency); Freedom of Conscience and Information (associated with the current crusade against corruption and for justice and rule of law); which should together create conditions for the absence of manifest violence, of peace and security, the presence of social justice and of stability and development within the polity. Justice Oputa believes that while every government is of the people and by the people, something more is needed for it to qualify as a democracy. The decisive link, the Grand Jurist says, “is that the government should be truly for the people and not merely for the minority elite at the apex of the five pyramids of power which he identified as Political power, Economic power, Press power, Religious power and the Bureaucratic or Civil Service power”. For according to him at the “base of these pyramids are the common people, the focus of governance. This he considered as the challenge of good governance” and for which the author adds, “the essence of democratic principle” and not who is the President or Governor. It is because the occupiers of these five pyramids of power have lost focus and appreciation of the essence of governance and had rather substituted it with the marginalization of ethnic minorities and pauperization of the masses with the attendant instability in the polity that Eddie Iroh in review of the current marginalization of ethnic minorities had to state: “Nigeria has been facing this challenge from pre colonial era to date, which would suggest that either we as a people have not been sincere and serious, or we do not have the creative intellectual resources to tackle such a recalcitrant problem.”
Presidency for the South-South or South East in 2007
It is this lack of creative approach and insincerity of the present crop of politicians that has been responsible for the present clamour for who produces the next president for Nigeria. For how else can any top member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party from the Southern part of Nigeria and the Igbos in particular come out to talk about zoning the Presidency to the South or the Igbos in 2007 when they were party to the party’s decision that the Presidency would move to the North after the South would have completed its 8 years tenure. The agreement we gathered did not state that power shall rotate to the North after the West would have completed its eight years tenure. All the arguments being advanced by the Igbos in PDP today were known to them in 1999 but they were then more interested in their own posts and what to gain as individuals than on equity and justice. Any person in the top hierarchy of the party from the South who sincerely wishes to fight this battle and would want the Igbos to follow him must first of all resign his membership of the party; or swear to the people that he/she would nor accept the Vice Presidency position if offered. It is the author’s view that the present call from some quarters is aimed at attracting attention for a possible position of a Vice President, senatorial or ambassadorial position. It is not for the interest of the masses, the polity or the current democratic experiment which some of them are working to ruin through their brazen rigging of the last national and local government elections. The concern of the polity and the masses should be on enthroning good governance, justice, equity and fair play in all facets of the national life. The achievement of this depends on the effectiveness of the legislature at all levels of government. When the structure for good governance is laid any body can be a President. The present clamour is capable of breeding mediocrity.
The Legislative and the Nigerian Democratic Experiment
The ability of the nation to achieve sustainable, just and egalitarian society that enjoys stability and characterized by developmental activities in all aspects of national, state and community level depends on the presence of a vibrant, focused and patriotic legislature. Unfortunately what we have witnessed in the past couple of years deviate completely from the four-way test of Rotary or the four cardinal points of the Association of Seadogs. What we have today is a legislature that is vindictive – as in the case of the Labour Reform Bill or the Autonomy bill for the Universities; corrupt as manifested in the night amendment of the electoral act; discriminatory as in the offshore – onshore dichotomy bill; selfish through its continued opposition to the convocation of a National Conference etc. The present acts of the executive and legislature can only breed stagnation and instability in the system. The legislature should not compromise an ideal and the constitution either because they want to protect their party (as PDP controls enough seats to pass any bill in the House) or to maintain peace between the executive and legislature. May they be reminded that the present “peace and co-operation” that is believed to exist between them can best be described as the “peace of the graveyard”. It is one that suppresses the aspirations of the people and that negates the principles and precepts of Democracy and Federalism. The present democratic experiment is hence being built on shaky and unstable foundation and is capable of exploding any time.
CONCLUSION
May I conclude by stating that for our democracy to survive, it is imperative that social justice and the rule of law be entrenched in all facets of our national life – in the Legislature, Executive and Judicial arms of our present democratic experiment. The country must be reoriented/re-engineered to adopt the Four Cardinal Points of the National Association of Seadogs and the Four-Way Test of Rotary. The engineering process has to start with the convocation of a Sovereign National Conference and by tackling the problems of the nation with patriotic spirit and not by towing ethnic or religious lines. Eddie Iroh in his Imo State University Convocation lecture concluded by stating that “we cannot run away from our problems by simply taking refuge in our bullet proof limousines” or covered plate numbers. Rather we shall tackle our problems with bullet-proof fairness, sincerity and determination; with bullet proof justice” and that “those fellow citizens who protest about marginalization and deprivation or other forms of injustices must be given bullet proof opportunities for airing their grievances. And they must go away satisfied that they have received a fair hearing. They should not and must not be regarded as enemies of the Federal Republic”. It is my considered opinion that when we carry out the above prescription, we would have succeeded in re-engineering the polity towards growth, stability and development and the spirit of patriotism and nationalism which are the driving force for unity and peace would have been born or consummated.
Thanks for your patience and for the audience.
Professor Ukachukwu A. Awuzie (KSM)
Professor of Landscape Architecture
Imo State University, Owerri.
