Nnaji Jekwu Onovo
Some Northern leaders including the Kaduna state governor, El Rufia; Prof. Ango Abdullahi (convener of the Northern Elders Forum), and Senator Walid Jibrin (Chairman, Board of Trustees of PDP) are advocating merit in place of rotational presidency as being practiced by the various political parties especially the leading parties in nominating presidential candidates. By all intents and purposes, we need merit in every sector of our society to achieve progress and development of the country.
So, I am not against entrenching merit in every sphere of our life especially governance; but rotational Presidency is necessary as an equalizer and balancing factor to ensure fairness, equity and justice in the country. Some Southerners are angry, accusing El Rufia, Ango Abdullahi, Walid Jibrin and their likes of being provocative and insensitive. They expressed their views and have right to do so. Each of the six zones has array of suitably qualified people for the office of the Presidency of the Federation. Think of it, every state governor or ex-governor is qualified to be President, just as senators and members of the House of Representatives are qualified to be President; not to talk of numerous party chieftains who are equally qualified to be President. So, there is no shortage of qualified persons in any of the geographical zones for the Presidency.
Plural and sharply divided societies all over the world attempt to manage their diversities and divisive tendencies through one or combination of policy alternatives in the organization and management of their public services for performance; and Nigeria is not an exception. Often times, these policy alternatives turn out to be delicate arrangements; but when carefully conceived, crafted and practiced, it provides opportunity for centre-seeking and centre-fleeing forces to interact peacefully and co-habit on agreed terms. One of such policy alternatives adopted for the management of public service in Nigeria for even representation is the federal character principle, which “was borne out of the need to ensure…even spread of government appointments…in all the regions, states and local government councils in the country.”
Today, different groups within the federating units of Nigeria are contending for their own share of the power at the centre the ‘national cake’ and this has brought to the fore the suitability and effectiveness of the various national policy interventions especially federal character principle toward ensuring national stability in the Nigerian body polity because according to Dahl (1976) “conflict and consensus are both important aspects of political systems. People who live together never agree about everything, but if they are to continue to live together, they cannot continue to wholly disagree in their aims”. The groups, as indispensable units of the Nigerian political system, devised some sort of political strategies that can help them achieve national integration. Therefore, an understanding of this interplay and group dynamism will lead to an understanding of the peculiarities, and realities of the practice or implementation of federalism and federal character principle in Nigeria.
In the wisdom of political party leaders, they embrace the stipulations of the Federal Character, and have the unwritten/written codes of rotational Presidency to address the issues of marginalisation and domination in the country. If the parties are considering dropping the rotational Presidency arrangement, we should equally do away with everything related to the Federal character especially the quota system.
There is no doubt that these constitutional provisions are safeguards against discrimination in any form in the country. It considers Nigerians as citizens with equal rights, irrespective of state, ethnic, race, sex, religion and status. The framers of this Constitution just like the ones before it had the intention of using the provisions of federal character in promoting national integration objectives, and to build a united, free and egalitarian society for all Nigerian citizens. In design, the principle is expected to enhance national unity and integration, but in execution, there are a lot of problems, which borders on wrong application of the principle itself.
Federal character principle negatively affects appointment into the civil service system in Nigeria, when mediocrity is promoted in the name of quota while meritocracy is put on the back burner. This would ultimately result in low level of administrative efficiency, with consequent truncating of national developmental efforts. The federal character principle which was introduced in Nigeria to redress historical imbalances among the component units of the federation has become the Achilles heel of administrative efficiency in the country. It was designed to reduce those factors that would result in mutual distrust by ensuring equality among the states. Federal character is the guiding principle that regulates recruitment into the civil service with the implication that sometimes merit is sacrificed to ensure equality of representation among the states.
The noble idea behind the federal character principle has been abused by its operators through sheer manipulation of its objectives … by converting plumbers into engineers, and book keepers into accountants, all in the name of quota/federal character. Even the catchment area formula that was created to favour the educationally disadvantaged states goes against ethical standards. The scheme has encouraged mediocrity. Every year gifted students from educationally advantaged states are denied access to tertiary education as a result of disparity that exists in admission requirements of both educationally advantaged and disadvantaged states.
A truly applied quota system across the board is indispensable for inter-ethnic unity, harmonious and equal social development of all states of the federation. At the same time, a misapplied one on the basis of social-cultural and political differences is more of an instrument of discrimination, domination, deprivation and retrogression of “progressive” states.
Despite the noticeable defects of Nigeria’s federal system and the faulty implementation of federal character principle in Nigeria, these political techniques especially true federalism still remain one of the best political frameworks for governing pluralist state. On the same vein, rotational presidency is necessary to give sense of belonging to all sections of the country.
Engr. Onovo writes from Enugu