The North and the lingering restructuring question

RECENTLY, the apex sociocultural and sociopolitical organisation in northern Nigeria, the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), expressed serious dissatisfaction with the widespread insecurity in the region. It did this in a communiqué it issued after “a high-level meeting with northern stakeholders, including former state governors, ministers, service chiefs, National Assembly members, retired senior public officers, academics, professionals and other patriotic citizens.”  The communiqué read by its Publicity Secretary, Professor Tukur Muhammad-Baba, came after the ACF’s Board of Trustees (BoT) meeting. The purpose of the meeting, according to the ACF, was to find ways of responding to escalating insecurity, rising living costs, destitution, unemployment and other crises, especially as they affect Northern Nigeria. ACF said that upon a review of the security crisis in the North, it found out that there was a paucity of “current strategies” in the war against terrorists and bandits, stating that there was the need for the government to focus on “other measures, even unconventional ones,” which would “need to be considered and tried.”

Before the communiqué was read, chairman of the BoT of the ACF, Bashir Muhammad Dalhatu, had apologised to the northern Nigerian people for what he called the “collective failure of leaders” to protect the region from “one of the worst crises in its history.” He had also assured the people that the ACF was strategising to address “the existential challenges facing the North and Nigeria as a whole.” Dalhatu said the North was prepared to support constitutional review and administrative changes.  One other resolution of the forum was to rouse northerners towards fostering trust and unity among one another, without prejudice to tribe and religion. Significantly, the communiqué deplored the severity of insecurity in the North, including heightened banditry, Boko Haram terrorism and rising drug trafficking. ACF noted that farmers had abandoned their farmlands due to the fear of insecurity, while there was heightened displacement of farmers as a result of violence.  It had unkind words for the Federal Government, which it said had demonstrated crass inability to protect citizens, thus allowing the free reign of armed criminal elements. It thus called for an urgent reform and community-driven defence models similar to the Civilian JTF security method used in the North-East.

There is indeed a heightened level of insecurity in Nigeria, especially in the North, and this should border any right-thinking Nigerian. The ACF’s criticism of the tardy governmental response to the security challenges faced by the North is in tandem with the reasoning of the average Nigerian. It is gladdening that in its communiqué, the ACF expressed readiness to embrace constitutional review. However, it must be stated that none of the constitutional reviews of the past succeeded in giving Nigerians the badly craved relief from the existential crises bedeviling the country. Calls for restructuring have been ongoing in the southern part of Nigeria for decades. Groups, individuals and academics of various shades have canvassed the restructuring of the Nigerian polity as a sine qua non for the progress of the country. However, many leaders and individuals from the northern part of the country had always thought that there was an underlying subterfuge in the calls. At the moment, though, it is beginning to dawn on everybody that except Nigeria is appropriately restructured, every effort to make the country work will end up in futility. The insecurity in Northern Nigeria, upon which humongous expenditure has been made to no avail for decades now, showcases the fact that in the absence of restructuring, governments will only be presiding over mass bloodletting.

Government after government has attempted to paper over the cracks of an unrestructured Nigeria and the aftermath has been colossal failure. The current administration is the latest in purveying such cumulative indiscretions. There is the need for a proper reorganisation of Nigeria in such a way that all the gains of the country’s diversity and humongous resources can be made to serve the people who are providentially endowed with them. While we note the absence of attendance of leaders from the minority states in the North at the parley, we still assay to say that the time for northern leaders to embrace total restructuring of Nigeria is now. The leaders must come together with the rest of Nigeria and reinvent the Nigerian wheel.  It is time to face the reality of the country’s situation and eliminate the unitarism that has plagued Nigeria since 1966. The northern elders cannot realistically hope to address the problems of insecurity in the region, which have grown into epidemic proportions, while preserving the iniquitous status quo. For decades, the sing-song from the ACF and most Northern Nigerian leaders, with the exception of the Middle Belt, had always been that Nigeria does not need restructuring.

The ACF swore to protect northern Nigeria’s interest with everything at its disposal.  It is telling that throughout President Muhammadu Buhari’s eight years in office, a period that marked the deterioration of insecurity in the region, the ACF never issued this kind of statement.  The way out for the ACF, the North and Nigeria in general is to walk the route of restructuring. Threats and counter-threats just won’t cut it.

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