The South-South geo-political zone is leading the demand for new states with 17 requests, two more added to the 15 earlier forwarded to the National Assembly in 2012. The South-West Zone comes second with 15 requests, also with two more added to the 13 demanded in 2012.
A breakdown of the requests shows that the North-Central, which initially wanted 11 new states in addition to the six states it presently has, has increased its demand to 13 new states while the South-East has remained constant, coming fourth with a request for only nine more states.
Interestingly, the North-West geo-political zone, which presently has seven states is asking for six more. This is a departure from an earlier request in the Sixth National Assembly for seven more states.
The request for Bayajidda State, to be carved out of the present Katsina State was not listed in the requests for new states by the Senate CRC.
Sunday Sun gathered that besides asking for more states, the region also wants the geo-political zone further divided into two. The argument is that the geo-political zone, based on its land mass, is too big to be categorized as just one.
Bringing up the rear is the North-East with requests for only three more states. In apparent departure from what obtained in the Sixth National Assembly when there was demand for New Borno State, that demand has been dropped and replaced with the request for Savannah State by the Movement for Creation of Savannah State.
Requests for new states from all the six geo-political zones which stood at 48 in the Sixth National Assembly rose to 58 as at July 31, 2012. Between then and the close of submission of memoranda, the figure has risen to 61, according to records Sunday Sun obtained from the Senate Committee on Constitution Review (CRC).
The CRC stated: “We wish to note in respect of all the requests that not all of the signatories are presently serving as members of the Senate, House of Representatives, State Houses of Assembly or Local Government Councils as required by section 8 (1) (a) of the Constitution and in some cases, the memoranda was received long after the official close of submission. As such, if the signatures of those that are no longer serving at the various legislative levels are removed, the signatures of the serving members will not satisfy the provisions of Section 8 (1) (a)(i -iii).
“In all, none of the requests for state creation at the close of receipt of memoranda satisfied the requirement of Section 8 (1)(a)(i -iii) to justify a recommendation for the next step in Section 8(1)(b) namely directing the Independent Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct a referendum…”
Meanwhile, some senators told Sunday Sun that some members of the CRC were sharply divided over states creation. Some lawmakers cited the looming bankruptcy of some of the 36 states of the Federation, while others queried the rationale for pushing for an additional state for only the South-East.
Others insisted that requests for new states were untenable because the country’s economy could not support additional states.
Agitators for creation of the 61 new states may therefore have to wait as the Seventh National Assembly has effectively shut the door on the exercise in the latest round of Constitution amendments.
Investigations by Sunday Sun indicated that besides the fact that the agitators did not meet the criteria laid down in Section 8 of the 1999 Constitution (As amended), the National Assembly Constitution Review Committee has concluded work with the Senate CRC’s report before the whole House for debate.
The report, submitted by CRC Committee Chairman, Senator Ike Ekweremadu noted that all the 61 requests failed constitutional requirements.
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