David West
A former Minster of Petroleum, Professor Tam David-West has stated that those calling for a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) were being ignorant.
According to him, the convocation of the conference would not solve all Nigeria’s political problems.
Speaking with Sunday Independent, David-West said “They are talking of ethnic nationalities. Ethnic nationalities is euphemism for tribalism. In Nigeria, we have over 400 ethnic nationalities. How can you say you are calling a Sovereign National Conference of all ethnic nationalities?”
He wondered who would be there, and if whatever decision taken there would bind on every Nigerian.
“How many people will be there? Nigeria’s population is about 160 million. How many people will be in the SNC that will decide for us and whatever they say is final. Are they super-Solomon, are they super-human, are they super-wise?”
On the way out of Nigeria’s problems: “My solution is this. Let us go into the archives of Nigeria; there are so many reports and recommendations on how we can exist together. We don’t need any new conference. We need a body of tested Nigerians that are objective to go into the records. There are volumes of records in our archives,” he said.
“The argument that the 1999 constitution was imposed on the country by the military and that the confab would give Nigerians the opportunity of deciding their own constitution is wrong.
Continuing, “I am one of the 50 people that drafted the 1979 constitution. 1979 constitution and 1999 constitution are the same. That it was done under the military does not mean that it was done by the military government. The military never had any influence in what we decided.”
“We, the people of Nigeria ‘ does not mean that all Nigerians voted for the constitution just as the American constitution whose introduction also reads ‘We the people of the United States’ also does not mean that all Americans voted for it.
“The American constitution was written by 55 people some of them are from the same family,” he explained.
The professor of virology who said he was disappointed in renowned constitutional lawyer and a member of the 1979 Constitution Drafting Committee, Professor Ben Nwabueze, for supporting Sovereign National Conference, wondered how Nwabueze, who actively participated in the drafting of the constitution, suddenly turned around to discredit it.
He further warned the National Assembly against waste of public resources in amending the 1999 constitution, adding that it has no power to alter the constitution because of Section 9 which requires not only two-third passage of any amendment, but also its endorsement by at least 24 states Houses of Assembly before returning to the National Assembly for final passage.
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