…As Lagos Governor , others speak at
colloquium in honour of former Vice President
Lagos
State Governor, Mr Babatunde Fashola (SAN) on Tuesday paid tribute to former
Vice President and elder statesman, Dr Alex Ekwueme on his 80th birthday
celebration, charging that the celebration must be used as a platform for
national rebirth and a return to the highest values of brotherhood, restraint
and patriotism.
The
Governor who spoke at the international Colloquium with the theme, “Nigerian
Federalism: Building on the Ekwueme Legacy,” held at This Day Dome, Abuja added
that the occasion must be for a return to restraint, compromise and patriotism
before it can serve the true purpose of negotiating the basis of a truer and
better nation.
Governor
Fashola who also spoke on Constitutional amendment explained that the nation’s
quest for truer and better union will not be solved by changing a document but
lies more in Nigerians changing themselves.
Citing
a number of national realities,the Governor noted that the nation has not had
election malpractices because its constitution is bad and has not
had bad roads because of the kind of constitution it is operating just as
people do not drive against traffic because the Constitution is bad.
“Our education did
not deteriorate because our constitution is bad. We did not abandon our
farmland and resort to food importation because our Constitution is bad. The
crash of our stock market, our inability to eradicate polio, or to bring
criminals to justice and many other things that frustrate our people and drive
them in pursuit of a truer union cannot be laid solely at the door of a bad
constitution”, he reiterated.
The Governor
identified diminishing value system which must be restored as being
responsible adding that no platform can be better to make such a call for the
restoration of values than at an occasion when eminent citizens gather to
celebrate a man of values.
“I should not be
mistaken for suggesting that we do not need a better constitution. We will
always need one as our nation marches on in the comity of nations. Indeed that
is why constitutions always permit of amendments. What I am saying and I wish
to be clearly understood is that we must not put the cart before the horse. The
constitution cannot make itself. It is us who will make it. A better union can
only come out of a constitution made by people who are driven by the values, of
nationhood and patriotism”.
The Governor also
listed some of the values which must be preserved and nurtured to
include the nation’s choice of multi-party democracy which is
well informed urging that in spite of its limitations everyone must rally
against any effort to depart from it.
He added that a
Federal arrangement is the most appropriate platform for the expression of the
nation’s diversity and that political actors of whatever party must never
compromise on this just as he also urged everyone to see natural disasters or
aggression against the nation from within or outside as a threat to all while
every citizen must abandon their political colors for the Green White and Green
whenever events of this nature occur.
“I think that the
mere occurrence of natural disasters or acts of terror must not on their own
become soap boxes for scoring cheap political gains; although I concede that
the methodology for their resolution can always be a matter for debate,
especially if a superior choice or alternative is offered. I also believe we
must be politically and ethnically blind when issues of crime arise. These are
the quickest ways to reinforce beliefs in our judicial system. The practice
that is evolving where a political party or leaders of an ethnic or religious
group begin to garner support for a person accused of a crime diminishes our
values”, Governor Fashola emphasized.
He also said the
protection of Lagos as the commercial capital of Nigeria, the first or second
home of every Nigerian, the refuge of the oppressed people of Nigeria, the
theatre where the Nigerian dream of grass or grace has been repeatedly enacted
from generation after generation must be something that must be devoid of
partisan politics.
While explaining the
decision of Lagos not to support the proposal for the creation of six
geo-political zones, Governor Fashola said the constitution does not create any
entity without responsibility, personnel and funding.
He added that to
create 6 (six) Geo-Political zones will require personnel to head them, responsibility
for them to carry out and funding, ostensibly from the Federation account, when
the existing Federal, State and Local Government are all still asking for more
revenue.
He posited that the
logical questions to be asked are: which level of Government gives up its share
of insufficient funds to go to the regional structure? Which of the functions
of the Federal; State and Local Government will be ceded to the regional
Government?
“Is this not a recipe
for a default break up of Nigeria into regions that may clamour for nationhood,
contrary to the ideals of one Nigeria that we fought a civil war for”, the
Governor asked.
While conveying the
best wishes and felicitation of the Government and good people of Lagos State
to Dr Alex Ekwueme, Governor Fashola wished him many more fruitful years of
statesmanship in good health, peace and prosperity.
“I do not call him a
statesman lightly or without thought. Nigeria has known a few good men and
without a doubt, Dr. Alex Ekwueme is one of them. It is therefore always easy
to acknowledge men like him. The silence of their quiet achievements is so
deafening that they are impossible to ignore; thus making easy, the task of
paying them tribute”.
“Or how else does a
person show commitment and influence change but by personal example? And how
else can we describe the example set by Dr. Ekwueme as Vice President when
after all manner of investigation by the Panel set up by the military after
they took over government in 1983, it was publicly and now famously declared
that Dr. Ekwueme had left politics poorer than he was when he entered it and
that to ask for more from him was to set a standard which even saints would be
unable to meet”.
“I can think of no
greater honour than that which acknowledges a man’s high sense of integrity. In
a government that has continued to be defined by the depths of profligacy to
which some of its members sank, it is indeed instructive that one good man
stood out. A statesman indeed”, Governor Fashola reiterated at the event which
had in attendance eminent personalities from all walks of life in the country.
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