Foremost Northern political group, the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has proposed death penalty for corrupt politicians and other individuals.
ACF in its proposal submitted to the National Assembly said that anybody found guilty of corruption should be killed.
The forum said, “The law classifies crimes according to the severity of their consequences both on the individual victim, the community or the country. If crime holds a high potential to gravely harm or kill its victim, the more severe the punishment, which was designed to punish and deter offenders.
“This is to say that punishment must always fit offences. One crime that has proved capable of gravely harming or killing its victim, Nigeria, is corruption.
“Sadly, our laws have not recognised corruption for what it is. ACF recommends that corruption be recognised as a capital offence and made to carry capital punishment.”
“Corruption is regarded as commonplace among the country’s political class and men of power and efforts to stem it have been handled with kid gloves notwithstanding the establishment of anti-corruption agencies.
“Only few notable Nigerians have been tried and sentenced for corruption. The forum added that it favoured the creation of more local governments instead of states and that it was opposed to rotational presidency and constitutional roles for traditional rulers.
“It is the view of the ACF that the status quo be maintained provided that traditional rulers are insulated from political influences and the security of their tenure is guaranteed,” the Forum stated.
“It seems the nation has reached a level where the exercise (state creation) should stop or else the states shall become mere efforts or cost centres which consume the needed resources for other important aspect of the nation’s socio-economic and political development.”
It also added that there was no need to recognise six geo-political zones, adding that all that was needed was for the federating units to be made more economically strong.
Consequently, the ACF recommended scrapping of the Joint Account and State Electoral Commissions in the 1999 Constitution.
It stated, “Local Governments are very important tiers of government because they are nearer to the people. Unfortunately, the local government system has failed to deliver on its promises.
“The reason for the unsavoury trend has been the placement of the local government administration under the complete control of the state government. While state governors crave devolution of power from the Federal Government, they are reluctant to do so for local government . And they by doing so using the constitutional provision to deprive the third tier of government of what are due to them from the federation account.
“The Joint Account is one instrument state government use to eviscerate the local government councils. More troubling, the state governments use the State Electoral Commissions or Caretaker local Committees to approach to install their puppets at the expense of the wishes of the people with dire consequences to our democracy”
Commenting on states’ creation, it said, “It amounts to stating the obvious that the creation of states has brought some level of development across the country and stemmed mass movement to the former regional capitals.
“But it seems the nation has reached a level where the exercise should stop or else the states shall become mere efforts or cost centres, which consume the needed resources for other important aspects of the nation’s socio-economic and political development.”
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