For the former Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, the country appears not ready to stem the tide of insecurity in the country.
Speaking at the inauguration of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) committee on Electoral Act and Constitution Amendment, Ekweremadu said decentralization or devolution of power was the surest way to address Nigeria’s insecurity and fix the economy, a solution he said the government appears to be opposed to.
He said the security of lives and property had totally collapsed and called for urgent steps to pull the nation back from the brinks.
“The weaknesses in our structure and the constitution we operate have never been as pronounced as they are today.
“I must also add that it is unfortunate that the rain, which some of us shouted on top of our voices, forewarning the nation against and even proposed policies and sponsored bills to avert, is now beating us heavily.
“I rallied my colleagues and together we sponsored the Bill for the Creation of State Police in the 8th National Assembly.
“I am equally sponsoring a Bill for the Creation of State Police in the current Senate.
“Unfortunately, we do not appear ready yet or show a sense of urgency to stem the tide of insecurity or rebuild our economy through the decentralisation or devolution of power.
With the right political will, the amendments to the Constitution to achieve a decentralised police and secure lives and property can be achieved 10 days.
“So long as we run a dysfunctional centralised policing, for that long will our insecurity-induced pains and losses continue to rise.
“The community policing initiative is illusory, cosmetic, ephemeral, inorganic, and will certainly not change anything.
“It is either we do the right things to get the right results or continue to do the wrong things and live with the consequences of our choices, as is presently the case.
“We must also have it at the back of our minds that things will probably get worse.
“Therefore, I call on our party faithful, the media, the civil society and well meaning Nigerians, to put narrow political, partisan, ethnic, religious, and sectional interest aside, and seize the opportunity of the ongoing constitution amendment exercise to immediately pull our nation back from the brinks.”
On electoral reforms, the Enugu West lawmaker also enjoined his colleagues, political leaders and Nigerians to support the move to amend the Electoral Act to allow early primaries and electronic transmission of results.
“As earlier stated, we have dealt with the issues of seemingly interminable election-related litigations in previous electoral and constitutional reforms by setting timeframes for dealing with both pre-election and post-election litigations.
“However, INEC is still faced with challenge of short timeframe to conduct elections. The election management body still works under acute pressure in preparing and managing our elections.
“They still get court orders and counter orders even on the eve of elections as politicians squabble for their parties’ tickets.
“Therefore, the Joint National Assembly Committee on INEC has agreed to recommend to our colleagues an amendment allowing INEC to call for nominations at least 360 days to the election and submission of list of candidates by political parties not later than six months to the election.
“It means that if passed by the National Assembly and signed by Mr. President, INEC will call for nominations for the 2023 general election by February 2022, while the political parties will have up to July 2022 to conclude their primaries and submit their lists of their candidates.
“That way, INEC will have ample time to prepare for the elections and avoid the usual mix-ups, while political parties will also have sufficient time to deal with issues and litigations arising from party primaries.
“Ahead of the 2015 general elections, we amended Section 52 of the Electoral Act, to allow INEC the option of using electronic voting if it so wished.
“But it has become imperative to further entrench the use of technology in our elections by not only providing for electronic voting, among several others, but also by providing for the compulsory transmission of results from the polling units.”
