Elected Officials Shouldn’t Be Calling For Restructuring – Ahmad Lawan

Nigeria’s Senate President, Ahmad Lawan has come out to warn Southern Governors and other elected leaders against joining the agitations for secession or calling for the restructuring of the country.

He recently revealed this while fielding questions from State House correspondents in Abuja, and Nigerians have been reacting.

According to him, he is not against those calling for restructuring, but elected officials must not be among those advocating for such calls.

He added that leaders should focus on restructuring their states before calling for restructuring at federal level.

His words, “The call for secession or the call for restructuring, many are genuine calls even though I never believe that someone who is calling for secession means well or is a misguided person.”

“But I believe that when somebody calls for improving the structure that we have is a genuine call.”

“But I want to advise here, I believe that as leaders those of us who were elected must not be at the forefront of calling for this kind of thing because even if you are a governor you are supposed to be working hard in your state to ensure that this restructuring you are calling for at the federal level you have done it in your state as well.”

“This is because what you may accuse the federal government of whatever it is, you may also be accused of the same thing in your state.”

“So, we are supposed to ensure that we have a complete and total way of ensuring that our systems at the federal, state, and even local government work for the people, and that we allow people to participate in governance so that whoever feels that he has something to offer to make Nigeria better does so freely without any hindrance.”

“We should avoid partisanship, we should avoid regionalism. We are all leaders and we are in this together. The solution must come from us regardless of what level of government we are – whether at the federal, state, or even at the local government level.”