FILE: Similarities, differences in reports of APC restructuring and 2014 confab

January 29, 2018 4:29 pm

Chairman, APC Committee on True Federalism/Gov Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State (L), presenting the committee’s report to the National Chairman of APC, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, at the APC Secretariat in Abuja

The All Progressives Congress (APC) committee on restructuring on Thursday released full details of its recommendations regarding key national issues.

The committee was set up three years after the administration of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan organised a conference with a similar agenda.

The purpose of the 2014 conference, which was led by Idris Kutigi, a retired justice, never came to fruition as its recommendations were “dumped” by the current administration.

However, from the issue of local government autonomy to resource control, there are areas in which the two reports agree on; same as areas they differ.

Below is the comparison of these key areas:

S/N	ISSUES	2014 CONFAB REPORT	APC RESTRUCTURING C’TTEE REPORT
1	States creation	Recommended the creation of 18 new states for the three per geo-political zones, and creation of one more for the south-east to make the zone have equal number of states with the other zones	Voted against creation of more states “because to do so will merely create new sub-national bureaucracies and their attendant costs while reducing the share of federal statutory allocation accruing to existing and proposed new states.”
2	Resource control/derivation principle/fiscal federalism	Proposed assigning percentage for the increase in derivation principle, and setting up special intervention funds to address issues of reconstruction and rehabilitation of areas ravaged by insurgency and internal conflicts as well as solid minerals development	Resource control: Recommends that specific concerns of all zones be harmonized into the final resolution of contending positions in review of current system. Derivation principle: Recommends upward review of current derivation formula in favour of states and adoption of similar derivation formula in favour of solid minerals and power generation. Advertisement Fiscal federalism: Recommends upward review of current revenue formula in favour of states.
3	Public finance and revenue allocation	Recommended that the sharing of the funds from the federation account among the three tiers of government should be done as follows: federal government – 42.5%, state governments – 35% and local governments – 22.5%.	The current formula for sharing revenue which is at 56% to federal government, 24% to state governments and 20% to local governments should be amended in favour of states.
4	Form of government	Recommended the modified presidential system: a combination of the presidential and parliamentary systems of government in which the president shall pick the vice-president from the legislature and shall select not more than 18 ministers from the six geo-political zones and not more than 30% of his ministers from outside the legislature.	Recommends a continuation of the presidential system at national and sub-national levels but adds that concerns about corruption and high cost of governance must be addressed with seriousness.
5	Power sharing and rotation	Recommended that the presidential power should rotate between the north and the south and among the six geo-political zones while the governorship will rotate among the three senatorial districts in a state.	Proposed that the complexity of power sharing and rotation be managed at the party level rather than it being provided for in the constitution or have a dedicated law.
6	Local government autonomy	Recommended scrapping of the local government with the federal and states being the only tiers of government and states, creating as many local governments they want.	Same recommendation, but in this case, ststaes are to develop a “local administrative system” that is relevant and peculiar to them.
7	Independent candidature	Recommended that every Nigerian who meets the specified condition in the Electoral Act should be free to contest elections as an independent candidate.	Same recommendation, in addition to having strong eligibility criteria and process checks in order to prevent abuse by unserious candidates.
8	Land Use Act	Proposed that the act should remain in the constitution but be amended to take care of those concerns, particularly on compensation in section 29 (4) of the Act to read “land owners should determine the price and value of their land based on open market value.”	Also recommended that the act should be retained in the constitution, but with no amendment made.
9	Legislature	Proposed a bi-cameral legislature but in this case, all elected members of the legislative arms of all the tiers of government should serve on part-time basis.	The status quo should be maitained as it is.
10	Power sharing/rotation	Recommended that the presidential power should rotate between the north and the south and among the six geo-political zones while the governorship will rotate among the three senatorial districts in a state.	Proposed that the issue should be managed at the party level rather than it being provided for in the constitution.