Tony Nnadi, NINAS
19 December 2023
Early afternoon of December 14, 2023, I received from multiple sources a video clip of the Postulations and Prescriptions of Olisa Agbakoba regarding the options that could be explored to rework the damaged Constitutional Basis of Nigeria. (Link to the said video HERE: https://youtu.be/XwoT9gQgUSc)
The event was the December 14, 2023 Colloquium in Abuja which had present, high stewards of the Nigerian State including Bola Tinubu and Godswill Akpabio, (President of Nigeria and President of the Nigerian Senate respectively).
One would ask:
“Which Constitution is Olisa Agbakoba talking about here?”
Is it the Fraud of 1999 or another, and who taught Olisa Agbakoba that kind of weird Jurisprudence in which the National Assembly can grab the Sovereignty of the Peoples of Nigeria through the backdoor of Section 4(1) of the Fraud called “the 1999 Constitution” imposed via Abdulsalami Abubakar’s Decree No.24 of 1999?
Is it that Olisa Agbakoba does not know that by a written confession published in the Vanguard Newspaper of March 22, 2013, and titled: “The Mistake Rotimi Williams and I made about Nigeria’s Constitution”, late Prof Ben Nwabueze formally admitted and regretted the tragic error of midwifing the 1979 Constitution in a manner that hijacked the Sovereignty of the Peoples of Nigeria, as Nigeria wobbled in the throes of the 1999 Constitution which was the reincarnation of the Illicit 1979 Constitution by Abdulsalami Abubakar’s Decree No.24 of 1999 labeled “the 1999 Constitution” of Nigeria? (Link to the Vanguard publication HERE: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/03/the-mistakes-rotimi-williams-and-i-made-about-nigerias-constitution-nwabueze/)
In the debate about Nigeria’s Disputed Unitary Constitutional Arrangements, the Self-Evident and Undisputed Truth, and the contention of NINAS and others who reject, and therefore seek the wholesale Jettisoning of the 1999 Constitution is that the Peoples of Nigeria, to whom the authorship of the 1999 Constitution is Fraudulently imputed in the Preamble of that Constitution, did not agree upon, make, enact or in any way whatsoever, approve of the so-called “1999 Constitution”.
That contention was the crux of the 2007 and 2009 Suits by which the arrowheads of NINAS successfully Challenged the Legitimacy of the 1999 Constitution in the Federal High Court, Abuja Division – Suit No.FHC/ABJ/CS/367/07 and Lagos Division -Suit No. FHC/L/CS/558/09.
The Attorney-General of the Federation of Nigeria filed a response to the Suits admitting our Case as a true reflection of the Fundamentally Flawed 1999 Constitution and so the Courts could not help the System to save the Distressed 1999 Constitution which is now being wheeled to its Interment.
It is against the backdrop of this truth and contention that one would ask Olisa Agbakoba: “On what basis are you now inviting the National Assembly of Nigeria to draw power from Section 4(1) of the Fraud and Forgery called “the 1999 Constitution” to cure the Foundational Fraud of 1999?”
Is it not tantamount to seeking to Finally Swindle the Peoples of Nigeria of their Sovereignty which the 1999 Constitution already hijacked and confiscated?
One would also ask Olisa Agbakoba what happened to his previous position on this same subject, particularly as postulated on June 28, 2018, in a VOR Colloquium where we both made presentations on the subject at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Victoria Island, Lagos?
Olisa Agbakoba, in his presentation at that Lagos 2018 event, posited that the Making of Constitutional Arrangements for the Union of Nigeria remains the Exclusive Prerogative of the Constituent Peoples of Nigeria in whom Sovereignty Resides, and that any suggestion about writing a new Constitution for Nigeria outside the Sovereignty and Self-Determination Imperative for the Peoples is anomalous and untenable. (Link to the video clip from that event HERE: https://youtu.be/mRH9xgvUUG4 ).
Let us note that in the dubious prescriptions made at the Abuja Colloquium of December 14, 2023, Olisa Agbakoba barefacedly invoked and relied upon what he described as the postulation of Prof Ben Nwabueze regarding some extraordinary powers vested upon the National Assembly of Nigeria by Section 4(1) of the 1999 Constitution under which the National Assembly could REPLACE wholesale, the 1999 Constitution in an autonomous process whilst consulting certain interests including regional sociocultural groups like Afenifere, Arewa Consultative Forum and Ohanaeze.
This suggestion is both disingenuous and dishonest because:
(1) The same Olisa Agbakoba WHO in 2018 clearly identified the Constituent Peoples of Nigeria as the Owners of the Sovereignties to be aggregated and Federated as “Nigeria” and who therefore possess the EXCLUSIVE right to Decide Whether They Wish to Federate (i.e., be in Political Union) and How they wish to Federate (i.e., Terms of Union), CANNOT turn around in 2023 to provide guidance to the illicit Federal Government of Nigeria on how the National Assembly can conjure some mysterious powers from Section 4(1) of the fraud we call “the 1999 Constitution” by which they can wholly discard and unilaterally replace the 1999 Constitution, in complete usurpation of the Sovereignty of the Peoples of Nigeria.
(2) I am not prepared to believe that Olisa Agbakoba does not know that Prof Ben Nwabueze in 2013 openly departed from his previous erroneous position on the true locus of Sovereignty, between the Peoples of Nigeria and the Government of Nigeria, in favour of the Peoples.
(3) The suggestion by Olisa Agbakoba that the President of Nigeria is now the Custodian of the Sovereignty of Peoples Nigeria is patently wrong and too ridiculous to merit further discussion in this Rejoinder.
The danger of the situation is that the comments made by both Tinubu and Akpabio in response to Agbakoba’s poisonous prescriptions suggest that they welcome those prescriptions and might be running with it. This Rejoinder shall serve as Notice to the Government, the National Assembly and all Stakeholders, that NINAS will Countermand any steps taken in furtherance of this brazen attempt to hijack the Sovereignty of the Peoples of Nigeria with these dubious propositions of Olisa Agbakoba and others who point to the National Assembly as the venue for Negotiating our Sovereignty, whether they are driven by Ignorance or Dishonesty.
I support this rejoinder with the NINAS Public Communication of May 9, 2020, titled: “The Legislative Mandate Of The National Assembly Does Not Extend To Constitution-Making” which explains why what Olisa Agbakoba recommended at the December 14, 2023 Colloquium is totally untenable and a Fraud against the Constituent Peoples of Nigeria. (Link to the NINAS publication HERE: https://www.ninasvoice.org/the-legislative-mandate-of-the-national-assembly-does-not-extend-to-constitution-making ).
Even the Fraudulent 1999 Constitution admits in Section 14(2)(a) that
“Sovereignty Belongs to the Peoples of Nigeria, from whom, Government, through this Constitution, derives all its Powers and Authority”.
As frantic debates continue across Nigeria for how to distil appropriate Constitutional Arrangements for the Distressed Federation of Nigeria, I challenge the Nigerian Media, as the Fourth Estate of the realm to rise up to the duty of advancing this crucial and time-bound Union debate by organizing a Public Debate on the subject, BETWEEN the Proponents of Sovereignty-Is-Vested-In-The-Peoples (led by NINAS and the likes of Tony Nnadi); AND Proponents of Sovereignty-Is-Vested-In-Government (led by the National Assembly and the likes of Olisa Agbakoba).
With the ubiquitous call for Restructuring and Grand Constitutional Reconstruction including the likes of former INEC Chairman Attahiru Jega and with the presence of both the President of Nigeria and the President of Nigeria’s Senate at the Abuja Colloquium of December 14, 2023, we may have arrived fortuitously at the beginning of the urgent Conversation that the Nigerian State must have with the Constituent Peoples of Nigeria currently trapped in what has become a Unitary Union of Death. By Organizing that Debate, the Nigerian Media can seize the moment and help trigger the All-Inclusive Union Dialogue that can arrest the current Free Fall of Nigeria.
Tony Nnadi.
December 19, 2023.