Those against restructuring don’t understand it – Odigie-Oyegun

Former National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun says most critics of restructuring are against the idea because they do not understand it.

He said that restructuring of the federation, if implemented, would help to revamp the nation’s economy, cool the polity and improve security.

He berated those accusing the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) of insincerity on restructuring, which was one of the party’s campaign promises in 2015.

Odigie-Oyegun noted that successive civilian administrations have failed to seize the opportunity at their disposal to restructure.

According to him, the current Executive and Legislature have a “unique opportunity” to restructure the nation to make it more viable.

“In this nation, no civilian government has succeeded in making funda­mental changes to the national constitution, except of course, with the creation of the then Mid-Western State, which was as a result of the political situ­ation at that time,” Odigie-Oyegun said.

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“The 36 states we have today were the result each time of military interven­tion and the military trying to respond to the expressed wish­es of the people.

“This is a very unique opportunity for the ex­ecutive and legislature to make a difference to the fundamental structure of this nation.

“I must say that if anybody is against restructuring, it is only because he just doesn’t under­stand. Restructuring, to him, is like a red flag, you wave it and he just says no without even con­sidering the merit.

“I think it is going to be fundamental to the economic development of this country, it is going to be funda­mental to the improved security situation of this nation and it is going to be fundamental to the cooling of the polity.

“Let me give an adage, if a child asks for cake today and you deprive him of the cake without explaining to him why he can’t have the cake at that time, his demands will keep growing and one day, he won’t ask for cake again, he will be asking for something much greater.

“And if you observe the way our nation is going now, there is a tendency towards regional agglomeration, it is creeping in, people are doing things by zones and the rest of it. One day, we will be having a demand for something much greater,” Odigie-Oyegun told Independent.