It warned that nothing will get better in Nigeria under the unitary constitutional order “no matter who becomes President in 2023.”
The Nigerian Indigenous Nationalities Alliance for Self-Determination (NINAS) has again reminded Nigerians that proceeding with the 2023 general elections without first 'demobilising' the 1999 constitution will only prolong the misery in the land.
It warned that nothing will get better in Nigeria under the unitary constitutional order “no matter who becomes President in 2023.”
NINAS Board of Conveners disclosed this in a statement two years after the December 16, 2020 Activation of the Joint Multi-Regional Constitutional Force, warning that failure to heed warnings may lead to grave consequences for the country.
The statement read, “By virtue of the December 16, 2020 90-day Notice of Grave Constitutional Grievances to the Federal Government of Nigeria and the consequential Joint Multi-Regional Constitutional Force Majeure (CFM) Proclamation, the Nigerian Indigenous Nationalities Alliance for Self-Determination (NINAS) Declared a Union Dispute bordering on the Sovereignty Questions arising from the Illegitimacy and Fraudulence of the imposed Unitary Constitution (1999) of the distressed Federation of Nigeria.
“The CFM Proclamation made a Five-Point Proposition, outlining an Orderly Process Framework by which the Repudiated 1999 Constitution could be eased out and by which Successor-Constitutional Protocols dictated by the Self-Determination imperative for trapped Constituent Components of Nigeria, could be distilled.
“(2) Let it be noted that: (i) In the 90 Days Period of Notice that commenced from the said December 16, 2020 Force Majeure Proclamation, the Federal Government of Nigeria, whilst evading direct engagements with NINAS, in obvious knee-jerk response, rolled out through its Legislative Arm, (i.e. the National Assembly), a bogus “Constitution Amendment” Exercise, lining up issues that relate to the Grave Constitutional Grievances outlined in the Force Majeure Proclamation, but a far cry from measures necessary for addressing those Grievances.
“That Amendment Exercise fell like a pack of cards when NINAS exposed the insincerity of the Federal Government for going the route of Amendments, especially because the Force Majeure Proclamation itself clearly established the fact that the Legislative Mandate of the National Assembly does not extend to Constitution-making as the National Assembly does not have Constituent Powers required for Constitution-making.
“(ii) At the Expiration of the 90 Day-Notice to the Federal Government, NINAS Announced a 30-Day Period of Consultations with State Governors and other Elected Officials from the Alliance Territory (March 17, 2021-April 16, 2021). Again, the Governors, (particularly of the South), instead of coming forward, hurried to Asaba to declare that they would all pass Anti-Open Grazing Laws by September of 2021 in obvious response to pressures by their Constituents ignited by the NINAS Constitutional Force Majeure. The Asaba Declaration of the Governors of course fell far short of what their Constituents were expecting to see.
“(iii) At the April 16, 2021 Expiration of the aforementioned 30-Day Period, NINAS Announced a 120-Day Period of Consultations with the Peoples of Nigeria, the Stakeholder-Segment of the International Community and other interests.
“In this period of 120 Days that ran up to August 16, 2021, we saw the various Nationalities across the South and Middle-Belt of Nigeria on the streets, Marching for Self-Determination, Demanding Referendums, in embrace of NINAS Grand Propositions for the Constitutional Reconstruction of the Nigerian Union.
“These Street Marches were replicated by our Diaspora in various countries and cities, culminating in the Joint Multi-Regional Freedom March at the 76th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York, September of 2021, even as a NINAS Referendum Petition was addressed to the Security Council of the United Nations.
“These two monumental achievements, namely that Countrywide Consensus against 1999 Constitution and the Isolation of the Caliphate Enforcers of the Unitary Nigeria foisted by that Constitution, go to the very core of the Nigerian Union Dispute and therefore constitute evidence of SUCCESS in the realization of the Main Objectives of the NINAS Constitutional Force Majeure, Declared December 16, 2020.”
It further noted, “It is also Self-Evident that the NINAS Alliance has Successfully ISOLATED and INCAPACITATED the Caliphate Enforcers of Unitary Nigeria which continues to cling desperately and tenaciously to the Dying 1999 Constitution as Basis of Union.
“It is significant to Note that even in the International Circuit, the Dynamics have changed radically in favour of the NINAS Alliance since the Caliphate Proprietors of Unitary Nigeria who are openly sympathetic to, and unabashedly entangled with Terror Groups like Boko Haram and ‘Fulani Herdsmen’ Militia, have in pursuit of Sharia and Feudalism, gone into open Alliances with Global Terror Networks, particularly ISIS, floating ISWAP. This Complicity with Terror has pitched that Caliphate against the Western Powers that are at War with those Terror Networks in the Middle-East.”