If you want to create one million states in your zone, that is your headache
"I expect them to come up with strong presentation on behalf of the people of South East and insist that if those things were not addressed, then the people shall review their continued participation in the Nigerian project.
Igbo led Biafra, but they were not the only ones in the struggle.
When the Igbo lost the war, that sent signal of what they can do in the event that they are not wanted in the country."
"What I am saying is that the Ndigbo were not in Nigeria by force.
We must remain in the country as a result of our collective resolve, not at gun point.
The Yoruba and the South South people have made similar comments at the confab.
An Emir from Adamawa State threatened to quit Nigeria for Cameroon.
He said his people would move to Cameroon if Nigeria did treat them well.
Our people are behaving like cowards at the conference.
The Igbo are never known to be cowards.
South East representation at the confab is the poorest since Igbo creation."
"We are not comfortable with the present federation units.
There are no real federating units at all in Nigeria.
Before 1963, there were 12 provinces in the Eastern Region.
Nine provinces in the Western Region and 14 provinces in the entire Northern Region, the South had 21 provinces and the North had 14.
The South was more in terms administrative political structure. In 1963, the Mid-Western Region was created from the South West which comprised Benin and Delta you have today. That reduced Western Region to seven provinces.
In 1966, when General Yakubu Gowon took over when there was crisis.
He started leveling the north and south.
He created 12 states.
He gave south and north six states each.
Thereafter, subsequent states creation kept reducing the south in favour of the north.
The target was the south east.
As at last count, Nigeria has 36 states, 19 in the north and 17 in the south.
In all, the South East had just five states."
"Without any formal meeting, some people just sat somewhere and reduced the political map of Nigeria and made the majority to be minority.
Someone set up the Dazuki Committee which sat somewhere and gave North East a whooping 128 local governments and gave South East just 95.
These are factors in revenue allocation.
Where on earth do you use desert to determine allocation of resources and creation of local governments where there are no human beings?
Chibok where school girls were kidnapped is a local government with just one secondary school.
There is no local government in the entire South East that does not have up to at least 30 secondary schools.
Some even have 50.
That translates to higher overheads in terms of payment of school teachers and demand for more infrastructure, yet, these are the people we are giving meagre resources to survive from the federal allocation.
Those who have no overhead and careless whether their children go to school or not use empty land as factor to collect fat revenue, yet, they are not satisfied."
"We think that this robbing Peter to pay Paul must to stop.
Let the six geopolitical zones become federating units on the basis of equality. If you want to create one million states in your zone, that is your headache.
There should be devolution of power to state and local government from the centre.
Too much power at the center is injustice.
There must be fiscal federalism.
You go to a state and say you must not drink alcohol and you collect fact tax from such state like Lagos and distribute it across other states that claim alcohol is a sin and they collect it. That is fraud."
"President Goodluck Jonathan has made things difficult.
I praised him to high heaven for conveying the conference, but what he gave to Nigerians with right hand, he has taken it left hand.
When the conference said on any contending issue, there must be 75 per cent vote from the entire delegates to scale through, you have given minority the tyranny over the majority because 26 per cent of the delegates can reject even though 74 per cent is in favour.
Even with the 70 per cent vote agreed by confab, how do you think any contending issue will sail through?
That is why we have groups threatening to cede from the country."
Source #Daily_Independent
"I expect them to come up with strong presentation on behalf of the people of South East and insist that if those things were not addressed, then the people shall review their continued participation in the Nigerian project.
Igbo led Biafra, but they were not the only ones in the struggle.
When the Igbo lost the war, that sent signal of what they can do in the event that they are not wanted in the country."
"What I am saying is that the Ndigbo were not in Nigeria by force.
We must remain in the country as a result of our collective resolve, not at gun point.
The Yoruba and the South South people have made similar comments at the confab.
An Emir from Adamawa State threatened to quit Nigeria for Cameroon.
He said his people would move to Cameroon if Nigeria did treat them well.
Our people are behaving like cowards at the conference.
The Igbo are never known to be cowards.
South East representation at the confab is the poorest since Igbo creation."
"We are not comfortable with the present federation units.
There are no real federating units at all in Nigeria.
Before 1963, there were 12 provinces in the Eastern Region.
Nine provinces in the Western Region and 14 provinces in the entire Northern Region, the South had 21 provinces and the North had 14.
The South was more in terms administrative political structure. In 1963, the Mid-Western Region was created from the South West which comprised Benin and Delta you have today. That reduced Western Region to seven provinces.
In 1966, when General Yakubu Gowon took over when there was crisis.
He started leveling the north and south.
He created 12 states.
He gave south and north six states each.
Thereafter, subsequent states creation kept reducing the south in favour of the north.
The target was the south east.
As at last count, Nigeria has 36 states, 19 in the north and 17 in the south.
In all, the South East had just five states."
"Without any formal meeting, some people just sat somewhere and reduced the political map of Nigeria and made the majority to be minority.
Someone set up the Dazuki Committee which sat somewhere and gave North East a whooping 128 local governments and gave South East just 95.
These are factors in revenue allocation.
Where on earth do you use desert to determine allocation of resources and creation of local governments where there are no human beings?
Chibok where school girls were kidnapped is a local government with just one secondary school.
There is no local government in the entire South East that does not have up to at least 30 secondary schools.
Some even have 50.
That translates to higher overheads in terms of payment of school teachers and demand for more infrastructure, yet, these are the people we are giving meagre resources to survive from the federal allocation.
Those who have no overhead and careless whether their children go to school or not use empty land as factor to collect fat revenue, yet, they are not satisfied."
"We think that this robbing Peter to pay Paul must to stop.
Let the six geopolitical zones become federating units on the basis of equality. If you want to create one million states in your zone, that is your headache.
There should be devolution of power to state and local government from the centre.
Too much power at the center is injustice.
There must be fiscal federalism.
You go to a state and say you must not drink alcohol and you collect fact tax from such state like Lagos and distribute it across other states that claim alcohol is a sin and they collect it. That is fraud."
"President Goodluck Jonathan has made things difficult.
I praised him to high heaven for conveying the conference, but what he gave to Nigerians with right hand, he has taken it left hand.
When the conference said on any contending issue, there must be 75 per cent vote from the entire delegates to scale through, you have given minority the tyranny over the majority because 26 per cent of the delegates can reject even though 74 per cent is in favour.
Even with the 70 per cent vote agreed by confab, how do you think any contending issue will sail through?
That is why we have groups threatening to cede from the country."
Source #Daily_Independent
 |
| SOUTH EAST DELEGATES ARE BEHAVING LIKE COWARDS AT THE CONFERENCE- SAYS CHEKWAS OKORIE: |
No comments:
Post a Comment