President General of Nigeria’s pan-cultural organisation Ohaneze Ndi-Igbo and former two-time minister John Nnia Nwodo has said the #EndSARS protest has presented a novel opportunity to the Nigerian government to address all the issues that have been plaguing Nigeria, describing the setting up of judicial panels on inquiry as scratching the surface.
He believes the problem of Nigeria is the failure of governance in the country, and that the structure of the Nigerian government cannot function as presently constituted.
“To begin with, the structure of government has failed and cannot work. We answer the federal government of Nigeria but we run a unitary system in Nigeria in which the federal government appropriates to itself the powers of the federating units.
“I think that this #EndSARS protests provides an opportunity for the government to say this system is failing.
“We are building huge debts, our total expenditure on servicing our debts is about 70% of our current revenue, no country can sustain that and we are continuously borrowing,” Nwodo said when he appeared on ARISE News.
He said the Nigerian government should concentrate on developing other sources of revenue as crude oil is receding at an alarming rate.
“What are we doing to develop alternative sources of revenue, agricultural, digital technology, digital education, infrastructural development?” he asked.
Nwodo took a swipe at the country’s legislators accusing them of not taking the job of lawmaking seriously.
“Watch the quality of debates that go into the National Assembly. The National Assembly is paid to do oversight functions and all these things that have surfaces in this protest but nobody does it. The job there is not taken seriously,” he said.
By Abel Ejikeme
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