Anthony Enahoro speaks again
By
CHIEF Anthony Enahoro, the veteran political thinker, nationalist politician, social democrat, pre-eminent member of his generation of the Nigerian political class, courageous fighter and dialectician in political tactics, has spoken again - to his country and the world. As has been the case since the early 1990s, he spoke, not as an individual, but through the political movement he formed 10 years ago: the Movement for National Reformation (MNR). In a statement reported in The Guardian of February 21, 2002, he returned, once again, to his core political concern in this historical period: the geo-political restructuring of Nigeria. It is not that Enahoro is concerned only with geo-political restructuring; it is that he sees ethno-linguistic autonomy and self-determination within the federation of Nigeria, and hence, the geo-political restructuring of the country along ethno-linguistic lines as the dominant political question at this time. My study of the dogged fighter convinces me that he is also concerned - and genuinely so - with constitutional secular democracy, the rule of law, human rights, social welfarism and egalitarianism, full employment, peaceful co-existence, governmental transparency and accountability, decency in public affairs and modernisation.
But as Saint Paul put it in relation to love, Enahoro is telling us that without the geo-political restructuring of Nigeria along ethno-linguistic lines, carried out through a Sovereign National Conference (SNC), we cannot achieve the other desirables listed above. Many Nigerians may not agree with him for various reasons - altruistic and not so altruistic, but I doubt that any open-minded and historically-informed Nigerian will fail to admire and respect the categorical and insistent character of his proposal, and the brilliant, serious, rigorous, passionate and thoughtful manner he has put it across in the last 10 years. I respect him and his proposition. Although I have my own doubts, reservations and fears, if a referendum is today ordered for a choice between his proposition and those of other professional politicians, I would not only vote for him, but would also abandon my job to mobilise others to do so. But that is not the end of the matter, but the beginning. We must look deeply, and equally thoughtfully, into his submissions. At the start of MNR's current campaign, in 1992, Enahoro proposed the restructuring of Nigeria into eight regions or federations - four in the North and four in the South. Nigeria will then be a federation of federations. A fundamental premise of this proposal is that there are, at most, 70 ethnic groups in Nigeria. He actually went ahead and listed them, not just in a single document, but in a series of them. If you challenge or reject this premise, or regard as ethnic groups what Enahoro classifies as sub-ethnic groups, or insist that what Enahoro calls dialects of a language are distinct languages, then you are logically bound to reject his eight-region structure. But let us follow his thinking and argument. In one of the position papers issued by MNR in 1992, the movement offered two reasons for their demand for the restructuring of the Nigerian polity. The first is the need to resolve "the nationalities question in Nigeria." The second is the need "to restore genuine federalism as envisaged by the country's founding fathers, by the creation of units large enough to perform the functions originally reserved for the regions but which have been progressively eroded by the Federal Government, by reason, among other causes, of the diminutiveness and impecuniousness of the present states." I would love to hear any Nigerian refute these two submissions, for I cannot.
Proceeding from here, Enahoro's movement proposed the following eight-region federal structure, where each region is itself afederation: Western Federation, comprising Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Osun and Ondo states and any additional states created therefrom (Ekiti State has since being created from Ondo State); South Central Federation comprising states made up of each of the nationalities, or group of nationalities, in Edo and Delta states; East Central Federation, comprising Anambra, Enugu, Abia and Imo states and any additional states created therefrom (Ebonyi State); South Eastern Federation, comprising states made up of each of the nationalities or group of nationalities in Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Cross River states (and we may now add Bayelsa State); Central Federation, comprising states made up of each of nationalities or group of nationalities in Benue, Plateau, Bauchi and Kaduna states (and we may now add Gombe and Nasarawa states); North Eastern Federation, comprising states made up of each of the nationalities or group of nationalities in Taraba, Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states; Northern Federation, comprising Kebbi, Sokoto, Katsina, Kano and Jigawa states and any additional states created therefrom (and we may now add Zamfara State); and finally, West Central Federation, comprising states made up of each of the nationalities or group of nationalities in Niger, Kwara and Kogi states. I agree completely with this proposal in 1992 and, on the basis of this agreement, I struck a one-man alliance with Chief Enahoro. I called the eight-region structure the principle of triple balancing: balance between the North and the South, balance between the East and the West, and balance between the majority ethnic groups and the minority ethnic groups.
Ten years later, in February 2002, Chief Enahoro and the MNR radically modified their proposed political restructuring. They now propose an 18-region structure, inspired by the same ethnic self-determination considerations cited above. In their new proposal they drew, in part, from the pre-independence Constitution of 1951, also, in part, they used "economic viability" and population as criteria. Twelve of the regions or federations, according to MNR, are "mono-nationalities:" Ibibio, Ijaw, Igbo, Urhobo, Edo, Yoruba, Nupe, Tiv, Fullah, Gbagyi, Hausa and Kanuri. Six of the 12 federations are in the South and six are in the North. I am very familiar with these names, except Gbagyi - that is, if the media got it correctly. But I can see with my mind's eyes where they are located and who their neighbours are. The remaining six regions or federations are designated "multi-nationalities," that is, each of them is a grouping of "small" nationalities, including in particular, Ogoni, Efik, Ikwerre, Annang and Oron (I know them very well) whose political leaders claim they are full-fledged nations, of equal status and equal stake, with the "big" nationalities in Nigeria.
Again, the multi-nationality federations are divided equally between the North and the South: three each. The Middle Belt claims the three multi-nationality federations in the North; in the South, the East has two and the West has one. (For geo-political determination of the terms North, East and West, please refer to the 1951 Constitution; and for south, refer to the administration of colonial Nigeria before the Richards Constitution of 1945.) As we can see, the principle of triple balancing does not hold in the 18-region structure. Even when I agree with, and tail behind, Chief Enahoro and the MNR. Why? Because, given Enahoro's fundamental concern - which I share - the new structure transcends the former one, that is, absorbs it and goes beyond it in the direction of the ideal: ethnic self-determination and popular and grassroots democracy. But this agreement is itself based on the inviolability of Enahoro's overall ideological framework detailed earlier, namely, constitutional secular democracy, the rule of law, human rights, social welfarism and egalitarianism, full employment, governmental transparency and accountability, decency in public affairs, peaceful co-existence and modernisation (and I may now add, genuine national independence). With this proviso I agree with them because their proposal is a giant leap towards popular and grassroots democracy. I also agree with the retention of the English Language as national language, simultaneously with the promotion of local languages for local use. But problems still exist.
First, Southern politicians and political activists will still insist on resource control or fiscal federalism and the establishment of state police. Many Northern politicians will disagree with these and even with the 18-region structure. Secondly, whereas Chris Akiri, an Urhobo nationalist, will be happy, the followers of Ken Saro-Wiwa in Ogoniland, and their counterparts in Efikland, Annang "nation," Oron "nation" and the "Atams" in northern Cross River State, just to mention a few, are likely to express reservations. Thirdly, what will belong to the Nigerian nation as an entity? How will assets be shared? I can see the struggle for the ownership of several towns and cities leading to civil wars" a la Yugoslavia. How will the restructuring affect national institutions such as the Armed Forces and the Nigeria Police? To be fair to Chief Anthony Enahoro and the MNR, they have dealt with these issues, and several others, in several policy statements since 1992. But I doubt if many people will still recall them. What is now required of the leadership of MNR is a collation and publication of these policy statements as a single document, a definite break with the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), less interest in the 2003 elections, alliance with popular-democratic organisations, and invigorated campaign for a Sovereign National Conference.
March 2002