Elder statesman and chairman of The Patriots, Professor Ben Nwabueze (SAN), 83, has written 13 prominent lawyers and political scientists to join him in a committee to prepare a Draft People’s Constitution that will be submitted for deliberation at the Uyo National Summit when it re-convenes and thereafter present same to the Presidency and the National Assembly as a working paper for the National Conference proper.
The legal luminary, who opted out of the Senator Femi Okurounmu-led Presidential Advisory Committee on National Conference/Dialogue on account of ill-health and medical treatment in London and nominated Chief Solomon Asemota (SAN), said he considered his appointment inappropriate because of age and ill-health.
Although, the Presidency did not accept his nomination of Asemota to replace him in the committee, he nevertheless assured that The Patriots would work with the Okurounmu panel to hammer out water-tight modalities for the national conference, if invited. In a statement he wrote on October 13, Nwabueze said, “I cut short my stay in London for medicals and returned to Nigeria on Saturday, October 12, 2013 to keep a long-standing commitment to chair the Anambra Literary Creativity Festival at Awka on October 15. It may be necessary for me, after my Awka engagement, to go back to London to continue my medicals.
“It is not generally known to people that I have been fighting prostrate cancer for some years now, and have been kept going by consultations from time to time with, and treatment by, a Consultant Oncologist at Charing CrossHospital, London. My appointment with the Consultant Oncologist had been shifted many times because of several postponements in the dates of The Patriots meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan and the National Summit at Uyo, both of which eventually took place on August 29 and September 3/4, respectively, leaving me free at last to travel to London on September 8 for my medical appointments.
“After The Patriots’ fruitful meeting with the President, a member of our team who has access to him on a personal basis was mandated to go back to get him to set up the Committee on the National Conference of which he had earlier given a hint.
Nomination of The Patriot member to the confab

My understanding from the contacts with him was that The Patriots would be asked to nominate a member to the Committee. I never expected to be appointed chairman or member of the Committee, and would, quite frankly, have considered such an appointment inappropriate in the circumstances. It is an appointment for a younger person, not for an old man of 83 years afflicted by ill-health. But The Patriots remain willing to work with the Presidential Committee, and to give it all necessary assistance, if called upon to do so.
“This is the area in which I think my contribution to the work of the Conference would be particularly useful, and I do not see this as in any way conflicting with the terms of reference of the Presidential Committee, although they (i.e. the Terms of Reference) contain a somewhat vaguely worded item, to wit, “to advise government on legal procedures and options for integrating decisions and outcomes of the national dialogue/conference into the constitution and laws of the nation.”

www.vanguardngr.com/2013/10

God bless u Sir.

We knw there are notable people with brains that we can call to help draft a woring constitution. But be rest assured, some people will hijack it and include clauses that makes then a god!

Just try ur best Sir, even though it will be fed to the shredders like Ribadu's report on the cabals!