[size=14pt]Zoning and the power shift debate [/size]
By Jibrin Ibrahim

July 11, 2010 01:28AMT

Zoning and power shift have returned as key terms in Nigeria’s political debate as politicians prepare for the breaking of the PDP pact that would allow Jonathan Goodluck contest for the Presidency. The new Chairman of the PDP has already announced the end of zoning.

Zoning and power shift became major issues in Nigeria because of the major transformation regarding identities and power in the country. Regional power was substituted by federal power and the only “cake” in Nigerian politics became the presidency.

The turning point in the debate was the June 12, 1993 presidential election that was annulled mid-way through the announcement of the results, just at the moment when it had become clear that M. K. O. Abiola, a Southern Yoruba Muslim had won a landslide victory over Bashir Tofa, a Northern Kano Hausa. Even if the truth of the matter was that Babangida, the then Head of State, was a dictator who wanted to rule for as long as possible, the Yoruba, and indeed, the Southern elite were convinced that the annulment of the 1993 election was a Hausa-Fulani plot to keep them out of power.

The 1993 election was considered to have been relatively free and fair and a good opportunity to start rebuilding confidence in the Nigerian nation-state. The annulment led to strong ethnic and regional fears that the so-called Hausa/Fulani ruling class was not going to allow a Southerner to rule, even if the person wins a democratic election. At that time, the Southern press had led a massive media campaign, the main tenet of which was that the Hausa-Fulani had sacrificed democracy to maintain themselves in power. It was in that context that the debate over zoning intensified and Northern political barons agreed to cede power to a certain Southerner they would select. They selected Obasanjo, and the rest, as they say, is history.

At that time, power shift was defined as a plea from the people of Southern Nigeria to provide Nigeria’s President. The argument, according to Charles Ibiang (Thisday, 11/2/99) was that out of the twelve Heads of State Nigeria has had, only four are from southern Nigeria and that the southern rulers were in power for only six, of the thirty-eight years that the country has been independent.

Alex Ekwueme, former Vice President during the Second Republic argued (Guardian, 26/1/99), that they coined the term power shift as an alternative to the concepts of zoning and rotation which had dominated the National Constitutional Conference of 1994-95. Section 229 of the 1995 Draft Constitution had stipulated that the Presidency should be rotated between the North and the South, Gubernatorial power rotated between the three Senatorial districts in each state and the Chairmanship of local governments between three zones to be created in each of them. These constitutional proposals were however completely discredited when it became clear that General Abacha had plotted to continue as “elected President” and that the zoning was therefore going to start from the North, the region that had monopolised power for a long time.

The Abacha plot had to be understood within the context of memories from the Second Republic. The then ruling National Party of Nigeria had adopted a zoning and rotation policy for the Presidency but when M. K. O. Abiola tried to compete for the party’s presidential nomination for the 1983 election, he only received insults from the party hierarchy.

Of course the calls for power shift are today coming from the North and in a sense, it is good that the Northern political class is repeating words and arguments from their Southern colleagues that everybody has the right to contest so let the best candidate win. Northerners had argued that democracy was a game of numbers and they had enough to win elections. If this is the case, they have nothing to worry about a Jonathan candidacy, as long as INEC can deliver a free and fair election.

I believe that in the long run, the real issue in Nigeria is not power shift but power sharing. Nigeria must re-create the multiple centres of power that characterised our earlier history and thereby reduce the very high stake that has been placed on the Presidency. The problem however is that the power shift debate has exacerbated the ethnic dimensions of Nigeria’s political crisis. There are too many losers and only one victor in the power shift argument, the person who becomes President.

http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Opinion/Columns/5592174-184/story.csp

True federalism will answer all problems.
Let the states be the power centers, then we will see who will involve themselves in a do or die for an empty center.

The whole concept of zoning sounds really foolish when you consider that Nigeria is meant to be a federation.

I think its hightime we 4get abt dis zonin of a thing and do free and fair election

Beaf:

True federalism will answer all problems.
Let the states be the power centers, then we will see who will involve themselves in a do or die for an empty center.

The whole concept of zoning sounds really foolish when you consider that Nigeria is meant to be a federation.

Are you aware that the igbo have started calling Obasanjo a betrayal because he's trying to do away with zoning and encourage so-called true federalism ? What does that makes the yoruba

~Bluetooth:

Are you aware that the igbo have started calling Obasanjo a betrayal because he's trying to do away with zoning and encourage so-called true federalism ? What does that makes the yoruba

I am not interested in this nebulous, tribalistic make-believe. Thank you.
What do you as an individual think about true federalism?

Beaf:

I am not interested in this nebulous, tribalistic make-believe. Thank you.
What do you as an individual think about true federalism?

now you can sing true federalism now abi ? I can't remember the last time we had that.

~Bluetooth:

now you can sing true federalism now abi ? I can't remember the last time we had that.

Clap for yourself and move on if you have nothing to say. Thank you.