It’s the process, stupid

Reactions to President Muhammadu Buhari’s new year broadcast in which he said that the country did not need restructuring, tend to suggest that he had brought the lid down on the debate. I do not think so. He has rather enlivened the debate.

I think it is good that the president has joined in the debate and offered his own informed opinion on it. The beauty of a public debate lies in its capacity to purge the rumbling stomach of ignorance and open the eyes of the public to views that inform and educate. All of us take something away from one another in a debate, no matter how debased or acrimonious it might be. I am betting on Buhari’s position in the debate helping us to take it more seriously in our hopefully genuine efforts to bring our country from the footpath to the more modern highway of development.

Buhari said: “When all the aggregate of nationwide national opinions (is) considered, my firm view is that our problems are more to do with process than restructure.”

Indeed, so. Compare his “firm view” with the non-view of northern traditional rulers and legislators. All we hear from them is that the north is not afraid of restructuring, as if anyone said it was. I find nothing in the debate to suggest that restructuring is inherent against the north.

I find the president’s position more articulate and more pointed in the right direction than that of most of the vocal proponents of the restructuring, most of whom take refuge in tirades and obfuscation without really dealing with why restructuring has become so critical to our national survival. It seems to me that what Buhari does not like about the tone of the debate is the retrogressive position being pushed by some of the debaters who seem to see nothing wrong with our to-ing and fro-ing in the name of progress. It exposes our impatience with systems we put in place. It does not help that each time we have problems with our policies, we ditch them. That is not the way modern nations develop.

There are two angles to the restructuring debate. One is physical and the other is administrative; or what Buhari now calls ‘process.’ His statement suggests that the process is the wahala.

We have been through both the physical and the administrative process of restructuring since our independence in 1960. We have restructured the country six times, turning the three original regions into four and thence the current 36 states. I fear that Lord Lugard would have some problems finding his way around the house he built and which has been turned into a maze. Poor man. 

Our administrative files show a jumble of administrative steps taken, some legal, some constitutional and some routine, to remake the country in ways that please the majority but offend, naturally, the vocal minority. Restructuring, physical or process, is a permanent feature of human and resource management in all countries. Given the dynamic nature of human societies, nations must always respond to new challenges to constantly put fresh wine in new wineskins. What served us in the past might no longer quite serve us now and need to be rejigged or replaced. Some adjustments must be constantly made to accommodate new challenges and exigencies.

Do we need physical restructuring? We still complain about the current physical structure because there are still minorities like mine that feel badly short changed in the remaking of Nigeria. Those who advocate physical restructuring argue that the 36-state structure has retarded rather than accelerated our national development down to the grassroots. The Atiku group, made up of eminent people from the South-East and the South-South geo-political zones, advocates the restructuring of the country into six regions. The late Chief Anthony Enahoro and his group suggested a similar option but settled for collapsing the 36 states into eight regions. 

The third option along this line came from the recommendation of the national conference convened by the then President Goodluck Jonathan. The conference recommended the creation of 18 more states. It pleased me because an Idoma state, APA, was number one on the list. The fourth is the position of the Yoruba that states that wish to merge be allowed to do so.

These positions deceptively look like the needle we have been searching for in the rubbish dump of our dishonest dealings with one another. Each of them presents tough challenges for the minders of the nation. Would the regionalisation of the constituent units of the federation solve our problems? Tempting as it may be, it is still retrogressive. From regions to states and from states back to regions is no sign of rational national progress. Nations do not progress by regressing. 

That leaves us with Buhari’s process to which I tag the word administrative to get administrative process. You would recall that the current debate made its debut on the national political space as true federalism. Although the phrase is a misnomer, there being no such a thing as true federalism when you get down to the brass tacks. Each federalism is peculiar, and therefore, true to the particular country that operates it. 

The military made physical restructuring easy with a red or blue biro backed up by a decree. That was how the 36 states and the 774 local governments were created. The generals also made certain processes easy too with, you guessed it, immediate effect. 

Of the two options, the administrative process of restructuring presents us with the real political, social and other problems that our nation is condemned to grappling with, if not all times then in the immediate future. It may sound simple, simplistic even, to suggest that the first step would be to dismantle the burden of centralisation imposed on our federalism by the generals. It is a strange and unproductive form of federalism. If we do that successfully we would take a giant leap towards truly remaking our country as a democracy. A centralised system is the enemy of federalism. 

In making this point, I do not wish to suggest that this would be easy. It won’t. It is complex and truly complicated. It is not merely administrative. It is also constitutional. But everything rides on our successfully dismantling military federalism. If we do, it would largely end the dissatisfaction with the process. It would, for instance, lead us into redefining the functions of the federal government vis-à-vis those of the states by taking a careful look at the exclusive legislative list and effect a true devolution of powers that would lift the states from the position of vassals into true constituent units of the federation. We would recognise the right of the states to be responsible for security within their state boundaries. A single federal police force derogates from the pluralistic nature of federalism. 

Now that Buhari has made his pitch in the debate, would he push it? I am not to sure it is a burden he would like to add to his fighting corruption and insurgency in the country. Spare a thought for a nation in quandary.