National Confab: Fasehun wants Boko Haram, Al-Mustapha, Soyinka in SNC

Juliana Francis

Dr. Frederick Fasehun of the Oodua People’s Congress(OPC), has recommend that some notably Nigerians be drafted into the Sovereign National Conference(SNC) Confab, including Boko Haram, General Hamza Al-Mustapha and Wole Soyinka. This was even as he recommended that the SNC be convened for six months, from February to July 2014.

Addressing journalists at Okota, Lagos State, yesterday, Fasehun said that Boko Haram was the major reason the call for SNC became recently rife, adding that he saw no sense in not including them in the confab.

He explained that over the years, bottled-up emotions and frustrations in the country had been allowed to fester; and their misguided repression accounted for the socio-political explosions, insurgencies, militancy and criminality that routinely occur nationwide.

He maintained that delaying the SNC had cost Nigeria much, saying that it accounted for the unnecessary loss of lives and insecurity the country suffers today.

According to him, the convening of SNC represented a giant step towards the resolution of not just the Nigerian Question, but also the violence, insurgency and insecurity currently ravaging Nigeria.

Adding, “There’s so much agitation in the country, not just from ethic groups, but also from insurgent groups. There’s hardly any peaceful insurgency in this land. The country has been lucky in managing insurgency. But if we want to discuss insecurity, then the insurgency groups, which believe there is injustice in the land, should come and tell us why they are flexing muscles. Let’s listen to ourselves and proffer solutions.

“And if you think Al-Mustapha does not matter, we’re deceiving ourselves. Try and go to the north and you find out the truth. Let’s extend a hand of peace to everyone. We’re all Nigerians!”

According to him, except everyone shields the sword and buries the hatchets and come to a round table to proffer peace, Nigeria as a nation will disintegrate as US predicted and Lord Lugard postulated.

Fasehun said: “The SNC is the last chance to save the Nigerian Federation. Recently, agitations have been rife that since the 1914 Amalgamation of the Southern and Northern protectorates by Lord Lugard was originally billed to expire in 100 years, therefore the constituent units of the Nigerian entity could validly, legally and statutorily exit from Nigeria in 2014. It would have been a tacit fulfilment of the US prediction that Nigeria would not survive beyond 2015. Now the proposal by President Goodluck Jonathan has averted Nigeria’s Armageddon. If the SNC fails, then Nigeria’s ethnic nationalities can begin to make moves to exist as separate entities and nations within ECOWAS and we can kiss Nigeria goodbye peacefully.”

Recalling efforts made by OPC and other organisations and individuals in the call for SNC, Fasehun revealed that one key reason for consistent crusade for SNC was the fact that the current political superstructure perches shakily on the foundation of a Constitution that the Military foisted on Nigerians.

“Unfortunately, none of these (Constitutions) ever evolved from any indigenous civilian efforts. Even where civilians were gathered to debate at a Constitutional Conference, the Military still had the last say on its contents, inserting and deleting provisions as per the whims and caprices of the powers-that-be,” said Fasehun.

While congratulating Nigerians and President Jonathan for this epochal move, Fasehun opined that the move would definitely guaranteed Jonathan, a place of honour in Nigeria’s Hall of Fame, as “the first and only civilian President to put in place a structure through which Nigerians will give themselves a truly people’s Constitution, a Constitution of the people, for the people, by the people.”

He also applauded the choice of Senator Femi Okunrounmu as the person to head the National Conference Advisory Committee, describing the choice, as putting “a round peg in a round hole.”

He stressed: “Not only is Okunrounmu a chieftain in the struggle that birthed democracy for Nigeria, he has been a tested political technocrat having served as a Senator in the National Assembly from 1999 to 2003. Also, Okunrounmu represents a group that has been in the forefront of the agitation for democracy and also the clamour for the SNC.”

Fasehun warned that Okunrounmu and the Advisory Committee must not be frustrated by powers that be, stating, “Their exertion must convene a Constitutional Conference, with the specific responsibility to produce a Republican Constitution for Nigeria.”

Fasehun kicks against the National Assembly involvement in Constitution-making or reviewing, saying that Legislators were essentially law-makers. He said that that while legislators fiddle and meddle with the Constitution, the aspirations of Nigerians are left unattended. “That is why universities have been on strike for four months running and there is no end in sight.”

 Highlighting the flaw in the 1999 constitution, which made a new constitution vital, Fasehun said: “The Constitution, in its raw form, failed to address the matter of succession for a Deputy Governor or Vice President whose principal went AWOL!”

He continues: “We shall like to recommend that the SNC be convened for six months, from February to July 2014. Elections will hold thereafter. The current generation of Presidents, Governors and Legislators will be the last under the 1999 Constitution. And 2015 elected Presidents, Governors and Legislators can begin to serve under the new Constitution. Spill-over tenures of Presidents, Governors and Legislators will expire upon the commencement of the new Constitution in order to prevent the existence of a hybrid Republic, one in which political operatives hold loyalty to two different Constitutions.”

While stressing that all ethnic people be represented at the SNC, Fasehun suggested some specific individuals and interest groups should be drafted into the project. His words: “We recommend the likes of Wole Soyinka, Olisa Agbakoba, Priscilla Kuye, Pat Utomi, Omoyele Sowore, Dora Akunyili, Julius Ihonvbare, Turai Yar’Adua, Doyin Abiola, Shehu Sani, Tanko Yakassai, Hamza Al-Mustapha, Frank Kokori, Umar Dangiwa, Onyeka Onwenu, Grace Alele-Williams, etc. Also special interest groups should be co-opted, including: Labour, Youth, Women, the Handicapped, the Aged, Traditional Rulers (one per state), the Clergy, NBA, Boko Haram, OPC, Afenifere, Arewa Consultative Forum, Egbesu, MASSOB, NDVF, MEND, Child Rights Advocates and the Press.”

He suggested that SNC should be pegged on the past works of PRONACO, the National Dialogue of President Olusegun Obasanjo and Nigeria’s past Constitutions. “The resultant document must be subjected to no endorsement or ratification by Executive, Legislative or Judicial action or pronouncement. Its ratification will be by plebiscite or referendum, where a majority of yes votes will ratify or endorse the new people’s Constitution. There must be no no-go areas for the Constitutional Conference.”