National Coordinator of Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), Otunba Gani Adams, has said that the South-West leaders that met at Isara-Remo, Ogun State, a few days ago have resolved to pursue a return to parliamentary system of government at the coming National Conference holding in Abuja, even as they left open the issue of resource control and revenue-allocation.
Adams said this while speaking with newsmen, disclosing that the geo-political zone is still networking to rally various Yorubas who believe in the Yoruba agenda as against those who believed politics should come before liberation.
According to the leader of OPC, the meeting tagged: A National Conference Preliminary Meeting on Yoruba position, which took place at the residence of chieftain of Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba socio-cultural group, Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, was held purposely by the leaders to enable them take a position that will be agreed upon at the National Conference.
Otunba, who said the National Conference became imperative due to failure of the National Assembly to restructure Nigeria, disclosed that the parliamentary system of government was arrived at after deliberation because “it gives room for grassroots leadership to the extent that those who will represent you will come from the grassroots.”
He said that it was the view of the Yoruba that the presidential system in operation “is very expensive and gives room for corruption.”
“Basically, any reasonable Yoruba who believes in liberation of Yoruba people, who believes that Yoruba people should develop at their pace should believe in regionalism.
“We believe in the four-tier of government, Federal Government, the region, state and the local government. That was one of the contexts that we agreed on,” he said.
Speaking on efforts of the leaders to rally like-minds in the geo-political zone for the conference, Otunba Adams recalled that past constitutional conferences, including the 1913 talk, the Mancester Conference of 1917, the Republican Constitution of 1963, among others were boycotted by some people.
He, however, declared that it was an established truism in history of mankind that “few people fight, majority benefit from it.”
Source: Tribune
