Afenifere added that the country is an unjust and suffocating system that must be restructured if it must progress.
Yoruba socio-cultural group, Afenifere in the United Kingdom and Europe, has said the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government missed a “golden opportunity” to restructure Nigeria as currently constituted.
Afenifere added that the country is an unjust and suffocating system that must be restructured if it must progress.
Afenifere added that Nigeria was in crisis of legitimacy because Nigerians did not see the country as their own, adding that this was part of the "ethnic, regional and religious clashes; abuse of constitution and constitutionalism", which thwarted Nigeria’s socio-economic and political development.
The Pan Yoruba group regretted that President Muhammadu Buhari led-All Progressives Congress (APC) federal government lost the opportunity to make Nigeria a modern state of true federation.
The group in a statement issued on Monday by its Secretary, Mr Anthony Ajayi, said since independence in 1960, Nigeria is still seriously challenged by crises of unemployment, corruption, insecurity, lack of basic infrastructure, giving ethno-religious colouration to critical national issues and general problem of good governance.
The group added that 62 years after independence, for a number of Nigerians, their world is one of seeming hopelessness and helplessness and a picture of what democracy deficit portends.
The statement partly read, "The socio-economic conditions of life have deepened mental entropy of the citizens and disquietingly have created a wide array of skeptical attitudes, doubt and suspicion with the performance of democracy.
"The shortage of good leadership can result in very serious consequence for everyone particularly those who are least placed to respond to issues of justice and human rights. Strident calls have been made by different stakeholders and constituencies, industry associations, civil society groups and non-governmental agencies, religious bodies, professional bodies and development agencies among others for radical and fundamental shifts in socio-political structures, policy frameworks, economic and technological systems, modes of regulation and forms of organisation that can lead to the evolution of effective governance.
"We the Afenifere have consistently called for restructuring. We continued to do so even under Olusegun Obasanjo presidency from 1999 and till now under the Muhammadu Buhari presidency. We are relentless in demand for restructuring because we believed that Nigeria as currently constituted is an unjust and suffocating system.
"The integration of Nigerian people without common action for collective welfare and progress is unthinkable. Uneven development exacerbated fears of ethnic and regional domination, leading the semi-autonomous administration of Nigeria's three regions (East, North and West) to pursue policies and programmes that further differentiated between their people.
"In using ethnic political mobilisation in the struggle for national political space, the political elites of a region wherever possible denied access to their regions to other political elites. Non-political elites joined the ethnic fray to benefit from the discriminatory system of distribution of social and economic benefits. Segmentation of mobilisation has continued around ethnic or religious identity and citizenship such that exclusive claims to territory with great human and material costs are made by various groups in different parts of Nigeria."
It added, "On 7th of December 2020, we published a news article in the press with headline, 'Write your name in gold, restructure Nigeria now - UK Afenifere tells Buhari, APC' with many of such publications yet President Buhari missed the opportunity.”