SENATE REJECTS SPECIAL STATUS FOR LAGOS

THE hope of many Lagosians to have Lagos State designated with a special status came crashing yesterday, if the content of the report submitted to the Senate by its Constitution Review Committee is anything to go by.

That is also the same case with agitators for State Police across the country.

  The report of the Committee also abolished the Local Government/ State Joint Account and also the restructure of the country into six geo-political zones.

Another major highlight in the report included the rejection of voting by Nigerians in the Diaspora.

 Further highlights include rejection of Rotation of Executive Offices among others.

For long, many Lagosians, including the incumbent Governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, have been calling on the Federal Government to give the state a Special Status, considering its strategic position in the economy of the country, and the fact that Lagos is home to almost every family in Nigeria.

But speaking on the matter yesterday, Chairman of the Review Committee and Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, said, "On Special Status for Lagos, while the Committee appreciates the peculiar needs and challenges of Lagos, it is our considered opinion that according such special status should be a matter of political decision, which should be kept out of the Constitution".

Justifying the rejection of the state police, Ekweremadu said: "We recommend that the preferred approach at this time is to critically look at the current Federal Police system with a view to sanitising and strengthening it".

He said that zoning arrangement was rejected because "the Constitution should not make Nigerian leadership subject to ethnic or regional considerations.  This should be a matter of consideration amongst the various political parties."

On Voting Rights by Nigerians in the Diaspora, he noted that " INEC is still grappling to strengthen its capacity to conduct elections within the country. It would be counter-productive to extend INEC’S responsibilities abroad without the requisite capacity".

Ekweremadu explained that items such as devolution of powers, creation of states, recognition of geo-political zones, local governments, fiscal federalism, mayoral status for the FCT and executive immunity were some of the issues dealt with by the committee.

 He said, however, that the recommendations of the committee were derived from the views of Nigerians as expressed in the memoranda submitted to the Committee.

"Since then, the committee has systematically aggregated and analysed all proposals, comments and experiences and translated them into constitutional review  recommendations informed by international good practices.

"While some of the issues highlighted above can be addressed through incremental amendment within the constraints of the provisions of Sections 8 and 9 of the Constitution, others, it appears, require an entirely new Constitution. Although our Constitution makes provisions for amendments, it has stopped short of specifying or making explicit provisions for enacting a whole new constitution.

"If this is not envisaged as it is the case with our Constitution, sometimes there is doubt about whether the amendment process could be used to provide a completely new Constitution. This and many other considerations are some of the unique challenges and opportunities that the Committee had to grapple with."

The President of the Senate, David Mark, urged all Senators to read and digest the Bill, so as to make informed contributions, adding that each Senator will answer his name by voting on each item for amendment.

Source: Compass