component units.
The laureate said it was wrong for previous administrations in the country to say that Nigeria's sovereignty was non-negotiable,
submitting that the position was antithetical to development.
Soyinka added,
"I am on the side of those who say we
must do everything to avoid disintegration. That language I
understand. I don't understand (ex President Olusegun) Obasanjo's
language. I don't understand (President Muhammadu) Buhari's language and all their predecessors, saying the sovereignty of this nation is non- negotiable. It's bloody well negotiable and we had better negotiate it. We better negotiate it, not even at meetings, not at conferences, but everyday in our conduct towards one another.
"We had better understand it too that
when people are saying 'let's restructure', they have better things to do. It's not an idle cry; it is a perennial demand. The Pro-National Conference Organisation was about restructuring when this same Obasanjo said it was an act of treason for people to come together to fashion a new constitution. Those were fighting words; that you're
saying, 'I commit treason because I want to sit with my fellow citizens and negotiate the structures of staying together' and ask the police to go and break it up and arrest us.
"I remember that policeman, who said if we met, that would be treason. I wasn't a member of PRONACO at the time. That's when I joined PRONACO. If you're saying to me, 'I am a second-class citizen; I cannot sit down and discuss the articles, the protocols of staying together' and you're trying to bully me, I won't accept."
He said Nigeria could not continue with a centralisation policy, which encouraged what he described as "monkey dey work, baboon dey chop" mentality.
Soyinka said the over centralisation of government had resulted in resentment among constituent states, adding that the phenomenon
was insulting and promoted anti-healthy rivalry among states.
He stated,
"We cannot continue to allow a
centralisation policy which makes the
constituent units of this nation resentful; they say monkey dey work, baboon dey chop. And the idea of centralising revenues, allocation system, whereby you dole out; the thing is insulting and it is what I call anti-healthy rivalry. It is against the incentives to make states viable."
He said the centralisation of government led to the proliferation of states during the military era when, according to him, a state was
created because the girlfriend of a certain military leader hailed from the state.
He said it was high time government
established state police to check the rising security challenges in the country, stressing that policing was more effective when localised.
Soyinka added,
"I know people get nervous about that expression. If you go to a place like England, you sometimes see two, three, four police (officers) just walking casually unarmed, but they are observing everything.
"Now, if policing is all of that, then I
think the police are more efficient if they are based within a smaller constituency than a larger one. Within such constituencies, the policeman virtually knows everybody. A federal, centralised system of police lacks that advantage.
"So, I find it very difficult to accept that people can be nervous about the state police. State police has been abused. Nobody is denying that; it's historical. Don't tell us because we know already. But isn't centralised police also abused? Look at what's been coming out from the last elections, not just the police, but the
military."
Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device from MTN
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