THE continuing reflections over the necessity or otherwise of a fundamental change in the country’s system of administration show the existence in government of an ailment that is urgently in need of a cure. The debate was lately underlined in the activities surrounding Nigeria’s 52nd independence anniversary, which provided both statesmen and public intellectuals with a vent to reflect on the health of the country. The views of four prominent politicians and those that may be called organic intellectuals have added more importance to the search for ideal system for a country that is stuck in a political quagmire since its independence from Britain in 1960. Indeed, the debate for system change is a function of the disillusionment with the status quo.
Prof. Ango Abdullahi, former Vice Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University called for the jettisoning of the presidential system of government for its inherent financial burden and vulnerability to corruption. He advocated a preference for a parliamentary system of government, which the country practiced in the first republic, truncated by the military in 1966. He further prescribed a structural encasement for a parliamentary system by a call for a return to the old four regions or the constitutionalisation of the unofficial six geopolitical zones as units of a Nigerian federation. The Chairman of the Action Congress of Nigeria, Chief Bisi Akande called Nigeria a ‘mere geographical unit’, apparently re-choeing the statements of Chief Obafemi Awolowo in his Path to Nigerian Freedom while reiterating the need for true federalism. Similarly, former Health Minister, Prof. ABC Nwosu, called for true federalism and the conversion of the six geopolitical zones into federating units of the country. In climatic bent, the former Vice President Atiku Abubakar called for the adoption of a parliamentary system of government and the restructuring of the country along the six geopolitical zones.
These views clearly indicate that all is not well with the presidential system of government which Nigeria adopted in 1979. It is even more symptomatic of the inability of the country to attain what some scholars have called ‘the rightfulness of the unit’. This necessarily engenders some questions: what is a presidential system of government? Why did Nigeria adopt this system in 1979? What are its contradictions? Is ditching the system the solution to our many problems? Has the country a constitutional problem or human integrity problem?
The presidential system is a governmental arrangement underpinned by the principles of separation of power among three key tiers of government, namely, the executive, legislature and the judiciary, and in which the executive branch is led by a president who is both head of state and head of government. The executive enjoys a great deal of independence that under normal circumstances, cannot be sacked by the parliament. This is probably why the presidential system is also called an executive government as it confers an exclusive range of power on the president. Under a presidential democracy, the president is not a dictator but bound by the rule of law and the basic laws of the country. A presidential system has some other characteristics considered advantageous for a plural society like Nigeria, for the reason that it has security of tenure with clearly defined terms of office unlike the parliamentary system where the prime minister could be booted out through a vote of no confidence. Besides, a presidential system allows for a degree of freedom in decision-making.
Naturally, the virtue of separation of powers in a presidential system in which the various arms of government are clearly compartmentalised allows for horizontal accountability. In this country, the ingredient of the presidential system permeates other sub-national governments such as the state and local governments.
The overriding objective for adopting the presidential system in 1979 was the desire to build a strong centre in order to avert the centrifugal strains that made the civil war possible in the first decade of the country’s post-colonial existence. An additional reason was to allow whoever would lead the country opportunity to solicit for votes and win a measure of national legitimacy. This preference has not healed, of course, the many contradictions of the Nigerian state. Cries of marginalization have persisted along with hegemonic politicking. Above all, the other components of the system such as unproductive raft of states in place of the former four regions have remained a drain on national resources and a constraint to national development. The power that presidentialism places in the hands of the executive is enormous. The president has an overwhelming control over national resources. But there is so much arbitrariness and the opposition is often muzzled, in the centre, the states and local governments. In this political climate, presidential system of government is synonymous with corruption. Incumbent executives misappropriate state resources while development is either absent on the agenda or takes the backwaters of priorities. Persons without mandates or electoral backing are appointed into high profile public positions accountable only to themselves and perhaps their principals. Competition for political offices are, in the words of a former Nigerian leader, a do-or-die affair.
Some Nigerians who have pondered over the country’s condition have argued that there is nothing wrong with the various forms of government, whether parliamentary or presidential system. They argue that the country has a problem of human integrity. The point is driven home that the systems work well in their native countries, namely, Britain and the United States of America. Nigerians are corrupt and the human deficits are transferred unto the political institutions to create an institutional integrity problem for the country. Equally, the structure of a government is a reflection of the structure of the economy and unless there is change in the relations of production which currently rewards indolence and allows for all forms of accumulation of state resources outside genuine production processes, whatever system adopted will fail. Then, the question: does a parliamentary system hold the magic wand?
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