‘Nigeria Needs True Federalism, Not More States’

A member of the House of Representatives for Degema/Bonny federal constituency, Hon Sokonte Davies, says that Nigeria needs the operation of true federalism to achieve true greatness.

Davies who stated this in an interview with The Tide in Port Harcourt explained that for justice and equity to prevail in the country, every section of the country should be allowed to harness and appropriate its resources and subsequently pay taxes to the Federal Government to sustain it.

He said he did not believe in state creation for the  sake of it, noting that if true federalism was practised in the country, Rivers State alone was qualified to have 20 States because, according to him, every local government area in the State has the capacity of sustaining itself.

The Reps member, however, noted that Rivers State deserves more than four States if the clamour for more states to be created out of the state was basically for the purpose of sharing the national cake.

He believed that with the enthronement of true federalism in the country, the clamour for state creation would be a forgotten issue.

‘You see, to tell you the truth, I technically don’t believe in state creation. I believe that everybody should be allowed to harness his or her resources and appropriate the resources, and pay an agreeable percentage of taxes to the Centre, to keep the Centre… But if it is a matter of sharing the national cake, Rivers State deserves more than four states”, he said.

The lawmaker who condemned the  bomb blasts in Abuja called on security agencies to be more vigilant and alert to avert future occurrence. He argued that if the blasts were purported to draw attention to the Niger Delta problem, the auspices   and timing were wrong.

Davies averred that though political undertones could not be completely ruled out over such an incident, the high commands of the various security agencies in the country should carry out a serious internal auditing to flush out bad eggs in their fold.

On the planned extension of the date for the 2011 general elections, the federal lawmaker blamed the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for not doing a thorough job before going ahead to release the time table for the elections.

According to him, when INEC requested for funds and the amendment of the  Electoral Act, it would have equally taken cognizance of other challenges facing it for the conduct of the elections.

“The unfortunate thing is that INEC, when it was asking for money, it also asked for the  Electoral Act to be amended, which was acceded to by the national Assembly. Why did it not bring out all these things? “ he queried, stressing that if the National Assembly would have accepted INEC’s submissions during the constitutional amendments, in respect of the time for the conduct of the elections, the elections would have held in November this year.

He, however, assured that the National Assembly would fast-track the process of constitutional amendment to ensure that INEC conducts credible elections in 2011, adding that,” we should also make sure that we do not create a precedent where the constitution can be amended willy nilly like any other ordinary document”.

Donatus Ebi