Okotie ready to engage presidential candidates on imperative of restructuring

Chris Okotie

Former presidential candidate and interim government campaigner, Rev Chris Okotie, has expressed his preparation to engage the presidential candidates in a debate over the contentious issue of restructuring.

In a statement circulated on Monday, Okotie’s spokesman, Ladi Ayodeji, said his principal expressed his readiness to debate with the presidential candidates on the imperatives of changing the structure of the Nigerian federation.

For some time now, Reverend Okotie has been at the forefront of a campaign for restructuring through the adoption of what he calls Aboriginal Democracy.

According to the spokesman, Okotie believes that the presidential candidates owe Nigerians an explanation of what they intend to do about the most important topic in the current political agenda, which is a new political direction and philosophy of government for the country, in view of the failure of the current system.

Okotie has said on several media platforms that to continue with the present transition is, “to embrace an elusive phantom”, adding that the presidential system is terminological deceit.

He rejected what he called the ad-hoc approach of all the presidential candidates to restructuring, which he said, merely scratched the surface.

“Aboriginal democracy is the holistic approach to the recreation of a workable system that incorporates all our political, cultural and economic realities under the prevailing circumstances,” Okotie argued.

The former presidential candidate said that the level of restructuring needed by Nigeria “goes beyond devolution of power and fiscal federalism, as being canvassed by many.”

He added that nothing short of a new constitution based on his proposition would give the country the new beginning desired by many Nigerians.

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