The Deputy Senate President and Chairman, Senate Committee on the review of the 1999 Constitution, Jibrin Barawu, on Saturday said the final draft of the constitutional amendment would be sent to the state houses of assembly for ratification before the end of the year.
Barawu, represented by the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, disclosed this while speaking with journalists at end of the two day South-West Zonal Public Hearing on 1999 Constitution amendment held in Lagos.
He disclosed that the dominant request of the people of the South-West during the public hearing include state creation, state police, local government creation, judicial reforms, electoral reforms, special seats for the women both at the national and state House of assembly, among others.
The Deputy Senate President also stated that the public hearing should not be considered as a jamboree but an integral constitutional requirement to ensure that the people have a say in the preparation of a document that govern them.
Barawu said, “The essence of what we have done within these two-days is to give Nigerians the chance to participate, so that their elected representatives will not sit in Abuja and begin to tampered with the constitution.
“Our founding fathers who wrote the constitution has made it so difficult for anyone to just wake up and begin to tamper with the constitution, that is why we are going through all this processes. Even after the national assembly would have done its job, we still need the support of 2/3 of the state House of Assembly before it could become an amendment.
“The whole essence is to ensure that the constitution which is our ground norms is not changed without the popular consensus of Nigerians, that is what we have done, it is not just a jamboree, it is not just a routine and I want to assure you that something meaningful will also come out of this just like it has been in the past.”
He said the committee would address lots of issues raised by the youth, women, traditional rulers, and other stakeholders for good governance and better Nigeria.
“We have heard Nigerian very loud and clear and we are going to Abuja to file our report and conclude this process. Part of our timetable is that before the end of the year a final notification as a proposal will be sent to the State House of Assembly so that we can round up the process without further delay,” he said.
Meanwhile, South-West Conference of Speakers of the State Legislature has said the lawmakers were in support of all the requests coming from the region.
The Speaker of Ogun State House of Assembly, Daisi Elemide who spoke on behalf of his colleagues, said, “We stand by all that our national assembly members from the South-West are doing on the amendment of 1999 Constitution.
“We stand by autonomy for the legislature, that is even already in the constitution but the implementation is where we have the problem. The main challenge here is our the governors, we shall continue to engage them to let them see reasons why they should allow the legislature to enjoy the autonomy as enshrined in the constitution.
“We also stand by full autonomy for the local government, we stand in support of the state police too. We believe that having state police will help a lot to combat the various insecurity challenges that are confronting us.
“We are also of the strong belief that roles for our traditional rulers which will be enshrined in the constitution should also make it into this ongoing constitutional amendment.”
Making presentation on behalf the workers in the South-West, the Chairperson of Nigeria Labour Congress, Lagos State, Agnes Funmi-Sesi, warned against the removal of labour issues from the exclusive to the current list, saying that the country’s workforce would fight such move.
Sesi said removing the labour issues from exclusive list to concurrent list means that national minimum wage determination, among others labour matters, will now be made under the purview of the state government.
She added that such move was a way to impoverish and enslave the workers, arguing that many states had even refused to implement the new minimum wage passed into law by the Federal Government last year October.
The Punch
