Editor’s note: There have been calls from every quarter of the country on the need to review the Nigeria’s 1999 constitution.
In a message sent to ZENITHBLOG.com, a Facebook user, Akinyetun Tobiloba explains the principle of social contracts as regards the Nigeria’s political structure and why 1999 constitution should be reviewed.
When we talk of social contract what comes to one’s mind are some political philosophers who have carve a niche for themselves in the aspect social contract. These political philosophers include: Jean Jacques Roseau, Thomas Hobbes and John Locke.
The above philosophers have given their own definition of social contract.
READ ALSO: Babangida drops bombshell, reveals why he annulled June 12
The thesaurus dictionary defines social contract as the voluntary agreement among individuals by which organized society is brought into being and invested with the right to secure mutual protection and welfare or to regulate the relations among its members.it is an agreement for mutual benefit between an individual or group and the government as a whole.
Former Military Head of State, Abdulsalami Abubakar
Bringing out the best in a constitution requires certain steps which should be followed and among those steps is referendum which simply means to bring back or refer back. It is a very important tool in the build up to an acceptable constitution.
Consultation is another important step to achieve an acceptable constitution. A genuine referendum and consultation was missing in the build up to the 1999 constitution and these two are very important to achieve principle of social contract.
After the death of General Sanni Abacha, General Abdusalam took over and promised to return the country back to civilian rule, true to his words, he appointed the INEC chairman with the aim of conducting an election, although people started to doubt if the country would be returned to civilian rule because of the absence of a constitution.
On the 11th day of November 1998, the General inaugurated the constitutional debate committee which has as its chairman a former justice of the rivers appeal court, Justice Niki Tobi. The committee was charged with charting the way for a new constitution for the federal republic. The committee submitted its report on the 22nd of April 1999.
The committee worked for less than six months to come up with a constitution with which a country as large as Nigeria will be governed with. Rationally, it is impossible (given that same period) to come up with a working constitution even for a small country like Togo not to talk of Nigeria.
The committee could not travel to every state in the country they only visited certain states. If I may ask those states that were not visited, will they not be governed by the same constitution? Perhaps may be the committee applied a research method where by states were selected
After reviewing the committee report expert were able to draw significant similarity between the 1979 and 1999 Constitution, the 1999 was like a duplicate of the1979 constitution. Another point to note here is that the both constitution was forced on Nigerians by the military.
So the preamble to the 1999 Constitution which states “we the people of the federal republic of Nigeria …….give ourselves the following constitution….” can be said to be a lie told against the people of Nigeria because the people did not give themselves that constitution.
We may say that the military government acted on Edmund Burke ideology which holds that governance should be left in the hands of the elite; the intellectuals etc. indeed Edmund Burke suggested that, probably because the period was characterized with low level of literacy.
PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigeria’s #1 new app
If he were to be alive today I am so sure he would have retracted his statement because the world has changed, democratic values have deepened, people now have the right to be part of governance because they are at the receiving end.
In the popular Gettysburg speech Abram Lincoln said: “…..that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth”
The above has become the most used definition of democracy, therefore, since Nigeria claims to be a democratic country, governance of the country should be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.
For this to be achieved, the principle of social contract has to be embedded into the country’s political life, starting from the constitution.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the editorial policy of ZENITHBLOG.com.
Your own opinion articles are welcome at info@corp.zenithblog.com — drop an email telling us what you want to write about and why. More details in Zenithblog.com’s step-by-step guide for guest contributors.
We’re ready to trade your news for our money: submit news and photo reports from your area using our Citizen Journalism App.
Contact us if you have any feedback, suggestions, complaints or compliments. We are also available on Facebook and Twitter. Subscribe to Zenithblog.com Opinion page!
Watch this ZENITHBLOG.com TV Video of some reports that President Muhammadu Buhari may be back to the country on Sunday, June 11:
0naze
No comments:
Post a Comment