Former Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, says while a new constitution is possible and will become ultimately inevitable, the nation needs to amend the 1999 Constitution to create a provision for achieving that.
This was even as he said that while calls for a national dialogue was not a bad idea, to put into operation the outcomes of previous dialogues and botched constitution amendment efforts would help the nation faster.
Ekweremadu stated these Thursday in Enugu while fielding questions from reporters on the sidelines of the ongoing zonal hearing on constitution review exercise of the 9th National Assembly.
“I have heard the suggestions for a new constitution over and over again. Some say, bring back the 1960 Constitution; some say bring back the 1963 Constitution. Some others say, okay, why don’t we just throw away this constitution and bring a new one.
“However, there is no such provision to do so under our present Constitution, unless you are calling for anarchy. If you say we need a new constitution, the answer is simple. When other countries like Kenya and Brazil had a similar challenge, what they simply did was to amend the original constitution in order to make a provision for how a new constitution can be enacted. We (the National Assembly) did it the last time, specifically in the 7th Assembly, including making a provision for a referendum, but it was not accepted.
“So, we need to amend Section 9 on how we can create a new Constitution, including the issue of referendum, to be able to do that” he stated.
The lawmaker, who chairs the Enugu centre of the South East zonal hearing, also explained that creating an avenue for a new constitution would also help make the constitution more organised.
His words: “We have done a whole of amendments, which many Nigerians don’t even know about. So, there is confusion already in differentiating what has been amended and what has not been amend. And it will only increase as we make more amendments. Even with ordinary Acts of the National Assembly, after several amendments or a far-reaching amendment, the usual and proper thing we do is to repeal and reenact the law.
“Whether we are doing a new constitution today, tomorrow or next year, we need to take advantage of this constitution amendment exercise to provide for and spell out how a new constitution can come into being.
“That way, at the appropriate time, we can now trigger that provision and be able to have a conversation, draft a new constitution, and go through the constitutional provision and have it approved at the requite levels and with the requisite numbers so that we can have a new constitution that will encompass all these amendments”.
On the calls for a national dialogue by ethnic nationalities, he said: “Once any nation runs into a problem like we do now, the usual thing to do is to say, okay, let us come together and talk.
“But in our case, there is nothing really new, say in this constitution amendment exercise from the past ones..
“It is not enough to talk, we have to agree on how do we operate what we discussed. That is the issue. Unless we address this, it will be like every other talks or confabs”.
