Prominent leaders of a Pan-Yoruba organization, the Atayese Group has demanded regional autonomy for the South-West zone and other ethnic nationalities in the country.The group made the demand in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital on Sunday where they gathered for a meeting and concluded that the demand for autonomy would enable each region develop at its own pace. The group noted that it had already “sent a bill to this effect to the National Assembly as well as to all the State Houses of Assembly in the six states of the South-west.”
Addressing journalists at the end of the meeting, the son of the late Adekunle Ajasin, Mr. Tokunbo Ajasin, said that Nigeria had been descending deeper into a crisis since independence.
According to him, an enduring solution to the myriads of problems in Nigeria lies in each of the nationalities in the country becoming a Federating /Constituent unit.
“The new structure of Nigeria shall be protected by a binding agreement negotiated and subscribed to, by all the nationalities in Nigeria and shall form the basis of the constitution of the Nigerian Union and may not be amended or modified except with the consent of all Nigerian nationalities expressed through their separate referendums” he said.
On the issue of resource control, Mr. Ajasin noted that “each federating/constituent unit shall have primary interest and control over its own natural resources with an agreed tax model and that each of the units shall have its own constitution, administration and internal security system.”
He also made a call for true federalism that should involve divulging from the federal government to the state and local government. “Some of the legislative powers hitherto allocated to the Federal Government shall be allocated to the Federating/constituent units in other words, devolution of powers” he explained.
The group made the call for a ‘Yes or No referendum’ from each state saying “the first step towards realization of this proposal shall be through referendums organized by governments of each of the existing states in Nigeria, with the agency of State Electoral Commission of each state giving people the opportunity to vote yes or no to the proposal.”
On till the military purge of 1966, Nigeria operated a regional system of government with each region having its own government and economy and then contributes to the federation purse.