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Thursday,Dec 24,2009
Dim Ojukwu and Peter Obi’s Re-election Campaign
Former Biafran leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, has reportedly vowed to return Peter Obi to the Government ....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Dec 17,2009
Don’t Cry for Me, Nigeria
It must have been around 1984 that Wole Soyinka declared his generation, ‘the wasted generation’. The 1....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Dec 10,2009
A Nation in Coma: Beyond Constitutional Provisions
Nigeria is once again at one of those junctures where tripping over the precipice cannot be ruled out. At issue is ....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Dec 03,2009
Uba’s Honorary Doctorate: Why UniZik Was Right
The recent award by Nnamdi Azikiwe University (UniZik), of an honorary Doctor of Public Administration (DPA), to An....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Nov 26,2009
Sanusi: A Radical in a Conservative Job?
Sanusi Lamido Sanusi is a very brilliant man. He writes the English language with remarkable authority, and e....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Nov 19,2009
Anambra State Needs Liberation
Anambra state has been in the news, often for the wrong reason, for much of the 4th Republic. It has in many ways b....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Nov 12,2009
Heroes, Democracy, and the ‘PhD’ syndrome
A nation that does not honour its heroes is not worth dying for –so goes the cliché. This appear....
By Jideofor Adibe
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Thursday,Aug 06,2009
Are We Trying to Pull Down Barrack Obama?
Since Barrack Obama announced a visit to Africa, his relationship with Nigerian Internet bloggers seems to have sou....
By Jideofor Adibe
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A Nation in Coma: Beyond Constitutional Provisions
By:
Jideofor Adibe
pcjadibe@yahoo.com
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Nigeria is once again at one of those junctures where tripping over the precipice cannot be ruled out. At issue is the President’s serious illness, and increasing calls by some Nigerians for him to hand over the reins of government to Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan. Militants from the Vice-President’s Niger Delta area have threatened to secede from the country if Jonathan is pressured to resign, as is being rumoured, so that another Northerner would succeed Yaradua, if he is unable to continue in office. The Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC) recently joined the fray, warning that any attempt to force Jonathan to resign could push “the country down the precipice on which it currently and dangerously balances” (The Sun News Online, December 6, 2009).
Supporters of Jonathan anchor their position on section 146(1) of the 1979 Constitution which says: “The Vice-President shall hold the office of President if the office of President becomes vacant by reason of death or resignation, impeachment, permanent incapacity or the removal of the President from office for any other reason in accordance with section 143 or 144 of this constitution.” The ire of this group is further fired by reports that Yaradua has never formally handed over power to Goodluck during the numerous times he has been away for health check-ups, including in 2008 when he spent 17 days in Germany. They contrast this with George W Bush handing over power to Vice-President Dick Cheney on August 29, 2002, just because he had to undergo a routine health screening (colonoscopy) with important side effects.
Those said to be leading the move for Jonathan to resign to pave way for another Northerner to complete Yaradua’s term in case of his demise or inability to continue in office, appear to base their own arguments on the fact that under the PDP’s zoning arrangement, the South had taken its ‘agreed turn’ of eight years, so to prevent the North from completing its own ‘turn’, would be unfair and unjust
There are a number of important observations on this issue.
Two, an essential spirit of the Nigerian constitution is anchored on rules that will help the various federating nationalities to co-exist amicably. The letters of the law do not always effectively capture its spirit, hence you have conventions, traditions, and other supplementary arrangements such as the PDP’s zoning formula to help build the necessary trust, sense of justice and fair play among the federating units as envisaged by the constitution makers. In other words, while Grover Cleveland, the 22nd and 24th President of USA might have been right that no “man has ever been hanged for breaking the spirit of a law”, it is equally true that advantages secured through a recourse to legalese tend in the long run to be a pyrrhic victory. Though the letters of the law trump its spirit in formal relationships, most people will prefer to deal with people, who, in selfless pursuit of justice and fairplay, are flexible enough to keep the spirit of the law, even if its letters, are not fully observed.
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