The National Assembly, the Nation-State and the “National Question” (2), by Usman Sarki

“They person not to recapitulate the past, but to physique up the future”– Karl Marx

In the treatment of the “National Question”, we Nigerians indispensable not beryllium reduced to recapitulating the past but really to beryllium seized with gathering up the aboriginal of our country. We indispensable beryllium made alert that the “National Question” remains a recurring decimal successful Nigeria’s past and politics. Even arsenic the National Assembly continues to service arsenic the disposable look of our typical democracy, it has struggled to supply clarity, equilibrium oregon solution to this astir cardinal enquiry of our statehood.

The dimensions of the “National Question” are multiple. Politically, determination is the persistent contented of power-sharing betwixt states and the centre, and the extortion of number voices successful a strategy dominated by ample taste groups. Economically, the quality persists implicit the organisation of proceeds from oil, state and different resources. Should the rule of derivation beryllium strengthened successful favour of resource-producing areas, oregon should equity request that each Nigerians payment arsenic careless of wherever resources are found? Culturally, determination is the situation of affirming the rights and identities of each communities truthful that nary radical feels alienated. And successful presumption of security, the dilemma remains: tin a centralised constabulary and subject apparatus adequately unafraid specified a immense federation, oregon should section policing beryllium constitutionally entrenched?

Each of these questions surfaces and echoes repeatedly successful the chambers of the National Assembly. They are debated, sometimes with passion, often with suspicion, and occasionally with resignation. Yet they are seldom resolved with finality. Instead, compromises are postponed, and tensions stay bottled up, lone to re-emerge successful caller forms of grievance. Thus, the National Assembly has go not the supplier of solutions but the perpetual signifier connected which the “National Question” is replayed successful stark contradiction of expectations and disappointments.

This request not beryllium the destiny of the institution. History provides examples of legislatures that roseate to the juncture and redefined their nations. The United States Congress, aft the Civil War, helped reconstruct a fractured national that endures to this day. The Indian Constituent Assembly of 1946–1950, drafted 1 of the astir singular constitutions successful the world, accommodating immense diversity. The South African Parliament successful the aboriginal 1990s transformed itself from the guardian of apartheid into the custodian of a caller antiauthoritarian order.

Nigeria’s National Assembly excessively tin prehend specified historical work if lone it tin transcend parochialism. It indispensable defy being reduced to a marketplace of bargains and recognise itself arsenic the embodiment of Nigeria’s antiauthoritarian will. Its members indispensable legislate not conscionable to make caller agencies oregon o.k. loans but to tackle head-on the thorny issues of federalism, gross sharing and law balance.

The existent mandate of legislators is not simply to service constrictive constituencies oregon to defer unquestioningly to the executive, but to safeguard the Nigerian national broadly. It is by addressing the “National Question” that the National Assembly volition beryllium judged by history. No president, nevertheless visionary, tin single-handedly reconfigure the federation. The judiciary, for each its authorization successful interpreting laws, cannot supply a governmental settlement. Only the legislature, successful its typical and inclusive form, tin trade a renewed societal declaration for Nigeria.

If the National Assembly shirks this duty, drift volition continue, alienation volition deepen, and the authorities volition stay fragile. Nigerians merit better, they merit a legislature that is not the echo enclosure of aged quarrels but the forge of caller consensus. They merit senators and representatives who deliberate not lone for themselves but for justice, equality and peace. They merit law amendments that reimagine the federation from its foundations alternatively than tinkering astatine the margins.

They merit laws that code poverty, inequality, insecurity and marginalisation astatine their roots. Above all, they merit a National Assembly that sees the “National Question” not arsenic an inconvenient relic but arsenic the unavoidable situation of the contiguous and the unfinished task of the future. The travel towards existent nationhood is ne'er easy. It demands sacrifice, imaginativeness and ...