…constitutional zoning must have multiple vice presidential positions, with an administrative vice president from the opposite zone of the president, and a ceremonial heir vice president from the same zone as the president, who would have the constitutional right of succession in the case of the demise or incapacitation of a sitting president.
Terrorism, perpetrated by Boko Haram, a militant Islamist movement based in Nigeria’s North-East, remains one of the country’s biggest security threats today, causing the loss of thousands of lives and the displacement of millions from their homes.
Barely a decade ago, terrorism and militant insurgency ravaged the Niger-Delta region, causing the militarisation of nearly the entire region by ethnic armed groups, the Nigerian Army, and mobile police forces.
The ensuing violence hit Nigeria’s oil industry, with the rise of piracy, kidnappings, pipeline vandalism and sabotage of oil production, cutting production down by as much as 60 percent by 2009, before a presidential amnesty programme was successfully commenced.
Barely a decade before the Niger Delta crises, the South-West of the country was torn by civil and political strife as a result of the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election won by the late M.K.O Abiola.
In each case, an intense struggle for power amongst Nigeria’s elite had implications resulting in violence, terrorism and other forms of insecurity; this continues to be the case today.
Nigeria’s systems of governance lack long-term strategies and plans for dealing with national challenges. Very often, policy decisions are made with election cycles in mind, rather than the sustainable long-term interest of the nation.
To address insecurity, terrorism, political violence, corruption and other vices, national policies and constitutional provisions should focus on the long-term sustainable future, rather than the next elections.
Urgent solutions are required to reduce the negative effects of the power struggle in Nigeria; this would involve managing ethnic and religious diversities through constitutional provisions for achieving regional equilibrium in government through office distribution arrangements.
This can be achieved through constitutional zoning, rotation of office, and power-shift.
A zone, in the context of this article, can be described as an aggregate of states and ethnic groups into a number of smaller regional blocks; at the state level, the regional blocks are the aggregate of local government areas and constituencies.
While zoning is practiced in several forms today, there is no constitutional backing for it; this has had grave consequences for security in the country.
Let us review a recent case.
The Zoning of Electoral Offices Between 1999 and 2007
In 1998, following the death of Nigerian military head of state, General Sani Abacha, and the subsequent death of M.K.O. Abiola, the winner of the annulled 1993 presidential election, the succeeding military rulers drew up a prompt timetable to return Nigeria to civilian rule.
The biggest issue at the time was the zoning of the presidency to the South-West, in compensation for the annulled mandate of Abiola, a prominent son of the region. Subsequently, all the major political parties zoned and presented presidential candidates from the South-West. Olusegun Obasanjo, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, won the presidential election and was sworn into office in May 1999.
In 2003, after one term in office, President Obasanjo contested for a second term, as allowed by the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. In the 2003 election, the Alliance for Democracy (AD), which was a major opposition party with its base in the South-West endorsed and supported the re-election of Obasanjo, the PDP candidate. The AD did not present a presidential candidate, which was a strategy in support of the incumbent, who is from the zone.
The example above is made to establish the importance that Nigerians attach to the zone of a presidential candidate, especially as it relates to the desire for rotational leadership. This desire surpasses a demand for merit, economic performance or anything else, but is strictly on the need for Nigerians to see leaders from their zone at the head of the federal government and states, as the case may be.
This desire is so strong that during private discussions with Nigerians, a keen observer would identify individuals unconsciously placing the demand for a president or governor from their zone above their best personal interests. Many Nigerian indicate a preference for having political positions occupied by someone from their zone, which inadvertently includes the acceptance of an incompetent from their zone over a competent alternative from a different zone.
This also applies to local government chairmanships, zonal associations, social clubs, country clubs, sports associations, and across all associations and groups. Nigerians love “Zoning”; we love “our turn”.
Whether “our turn” benefits the people or not is a story for another day. That is what it is, and that is who we are; it is, therefore, pertinent that we address who we are by identifying unique solutions to our unique national issues.
The Post-Yar’Adua Challenge
In 2007, after the eight-year presidency of Olusegun Obasanjo, a Southerner, it didn’t need reminding that the presidency had to move up North. The entire country knew and accepted that “our turn” was headed for the North. Just like in 1999 when it was unanimously agreed that power should move to the South, and specifically the South-West.
The unanimous acceptance of power shift to the North ensured that all presidential candidates of the major parties in the 2007 general elections were from the North. The AD, which had by then transformed to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), presented the sitting Vice President Atiku Abubakar as its presidential candidate; the All Nigerian People’s Party (ANPP) presented General Muhammadu Buhari as its candidate; while the PDP presented Governor Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.
Subsequently, Umaru Yar’Adua won the 2007 elections and was sworn in as president in 2007, fulfilling non-constitutional agreements and the desire for the rotation of the presidency between the North and South after eight years
The death of President Yar’Adua after three years in office triggered a force majeure, which threw up grave challenges for Nigeria, especially because zoning arrangements were not covered in legal and constitutional statutes. The zoning of the presidency to the North in 2007 made no provisions for a zonal based succession plan in the case of death or incapacitation of the president.
On the issue of the zoning of political offices, Nigeria has, unfortunately, been playing the ostrich. While we cannot quantify precisely how much the contentious issue of “our turn” has played in the exponential increase in the state of insecurity from the activities of Boko Haram, the Niger Delta Militancy, inter-ethnic and religious crises, to name a few, we are all witnesses to the thousands of lives lost following the 2011 presidential elections.
Interestingly, logical indicators show that the political tensions and violence of the 2011 elections in the North were a direct repercussion of contention related to perceptions on the “zoning of the presidency.” In the 2011 case, the North had insisted it was its turn to provide the president of Nigeria for two consecutive four-year terms, and felt cheated when power moved back to the South only after three years of the Yar’Adua presidency.
After President Goodluck Jonathan won the 2011 presidential elections, mobs – including several youth who ‘cut their teeth’ in violence and terrorism – ran riot, indiscriminately killing children, women and unarmed civilians. Not even one of those murdered during the 2011 post-election riots was a known member of the PDP. Not one government official was killed. Obviously, those riots were not party affiliated, and a lot of PDP supporting thugs formed part of the murderous mob of rioters
Curiously, after these riots, the mobs all walked down to polling centres two weeks later and voted for PDP governors in all the states where they rioted and killed innocent civilians after the PDP candidate was declared winner of the presidential election. The states involved in this included Katsina, Kaduna, Kano, Sokoto, Niger, Bauchi, Jigawa, and so on.
Addressing Ethnic and Religious Diversities Through Constitutional Provisions
The drivers of the problems mentioned above in this article include faulty foundations that fail to address the peculiar ethnic and religious diversity of Nigeria, which have compounded with each passing year and with every new, related challenge.
The issue of zoning is one that Nigerians are well aware of, but have chosen to ignore. We have not heard the end of it, as we still grapple with Boko Haram, an ever-present Niger Delta militancy, inter-communal and religious clashes, etc. Indeed, we may have survived the Yar’Adua succession challenges as a nation, but we surely would not survive a repeat of the same problem.
Nigeria may not survive the demise or incapacitation of a president in future, not because it is an unusual scenario, but because of the contradictions between our desires and practice, from that of our constituted rights and processes, and the suspicion that has become cancerous in our multi-ethnic and multi-religious society.
Fortunately, Nigerian politicians know this, and the practice of zoning, rotation of political offices and power-shift has deep-seated cultural basis in the country. While this has always been the prerogative of internal party organs, it has become necessary that Nigeria addresses the issue as one that requires urgent constitutional backing.
The goal of constitutional zoning in the Nigerian context would be to validate a pattern whereby the ethnic/regional origin of top political office holders alternate from one election or set of elections to another.
In the least, Nigeria needs a constitution that lays out clear terms for zoning, political office rotation, power shift and zonal succession.
While specific details would have to be worked out by legislators, constitutional zoning must have multiple vice presidential positions, with an administrative vice president from the opposite zone of the president, and a ceremonial heir vice president from the same zone as the president, who would have the constitutional right of succession in the case of the demise or incapacitation of a sitting president.
Samuel Diminas, a petroleum geophysicist, is the Chair of the Board of Trustees of Spaces for Change, Nigeria. Email: s_diminas@yahoo.com.
An Original Article with the same context was first written in 2014 by the same Author, this current article is an updated version
