Senate Minority Leader and senior member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Abba Moro, has dismissed the prospect of Nigeria replacing its current constitution. He maintains that pursuing targeted amendments is preferable to implementing a complete constitutional overhaul. Addressing the ongoing discourse regarding constitutional reforms, Senator Moro stated that amending the 1999 Constitution would be
Senate Minority Leader and senior member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Abba Moro, has dismissed the prospect of Nigeria replacing its current constitution. He maintains that pursuing targeted amendments is preferable to implementing a complete constitutional overhaul.
Addressing the ongoing discourse regarding constitutional reforms, Senator Moro stated that amending the 1999 Constitution would be more beneficial for the nation than draughting an entirely new one. He further observed that recommendations from previous national dialogues have largely remained unimplemented.
“Well, first of all, if you’re talking about the military fostering the Constitution of Nigeria, we want to ask what gave rise to military intervention in the first place?” Moro said. “We had a constitution, and it was executed in breach, rather than in implementation, and that gave rise to the series of crises that gave rise to military interregnum and aberration on constitutionalism.
“And here we are forging a path towards stability, and we are not in debt to conferences and recommendations. You recall that the government of Dr. Ebele Goodluck Jonathan, the 2014 confab, the high point of the recommendations in that confab was power devolution. That beautiful document was not implemented. Up to today, we’re having another series of conferences and gatherings of patriots with virtually the same recommendations.”
Senator Moro described the constitution as “a living document” that should be continuously updated.
“As we move on, certain elements that were ordinarily supposed to be there, that are not there, need to be included, need to be amended. Some aspects that offend even the basic rights of human beings are there that have to be removed,” he said. “And so I think that as long as we develop the necessary political will to continue to tinker with the Constitution and move gradually towards a perfect document for this country is a better pathway than the call for a complete overhaul.”
The lawmaker also questioned the legitimacy of those pushing for a total rewrite. “If you want to ask me how many people were in the so-called conference that is calling for a complete overhaul and overturn of the Constitution, who do they represent? They were there in the 2014 constitutional conference,” Moro said.
“We are here again. This time around, I can say boldly that the President, then Goodluck Jonathan, appointed some individuals, and various constituencies nominated some persons. But here, who can you tell me, has nominated or appointed this group of persons who are now proposing a complete overhaul of the Constitution, and must we continue like this as a nation?
“I think a point arrives in our lives that we must agree to accept what we have and, possibly like they say, think with it, to arrive at the perfection that we are looking for,” he stated.
