BY HENRY UMORU

AS National Conference continues with debates on the reports of its 20 standing committees, Southern Professionals have urged delegates to make the conference a success to prevent the occurrence of what they termed, a doomsday scenario in the country.

Speaking in Abuja at an interactive session with South-West, South-East and South-South delegates, weekend, Coordinator of Southern Professionals of Nigeria, Mr. Emeka Ugwu-Oju, warned that the failure of the ongoing National Conference will be catastrophic for the country if not well handled.

He stressed need for delegates to ensure that they give Nigeria and Nigerians six strong federating units, fiscal federalism, decentralisation policy (local, regional and national) with local and regional police heads directly accountable to the electorate; elimination of indigenes/non indigenes dichotomy, individual property rights, no state religion and freedom of worship for every citizen, sustainable and affordable social security, among others.

Ugwu-Oju enjoined the delegates to work towards uniting and keeping hope alive for Nigerians.

According to the coordinator, most Nigerians want to see a new Nigeria with a new constitution that would be sustainable, viable and strong, transparent, independent, cost effective, free and fair electoral system structures at the local, regional and national levels.

Ugwu-Oju, who promised the delegates that the Southern Professionals would support them in anyway feasible to produce the desirable outcome that can lay a solid foundation for a New Nigeria, said: “To our delegates from Southern Nigeria, my message and plea is straight and direct: Please, keep hope alive for the Nigerian people.

Many Nigerians believe that the current status quo of wealth sharing for the elite (poverty sharing for the masses) as against wealth creating political structures in the country is highly undesirable and unsustainable.

“To compound matters, the current terrorist insurgency in the country and the seemingly unbridgeable divide among the political class with regards to the 2015 presidential election creates a very likely scenario of total anarchy in Nigeria post-next Presidential election.

Corporate
existence

The average Nigerian now feels very insecure and by his actions is beginning to question the corporate existence of the country. I am yet to come across any Southern parent who wants his child to go and work in most parts of Northern Nigeria.
“The outcome of this National Conference may be the only chance of rekindling hope in most Nigerians that this country could still become a nation where its citizens could see any part be it East, West, North or South as a land of opportunity that should be explored.”
According to him, the probable Nigerian scenarios that would emerge if the National Conference fails are:
* The Presidential Election goes ahead as planned and the incumbent, if he is the nominated candidate of his party, wins the election. The opposition from their statements and actions has put Nigerians on notice about the impossibility of the current incumbent winning the election in a free and fair environment; in other words, if he wins, the election was rigged.
The opposition will then refuse to accept the election results and violence will erupt. Unlike in the past the ensuing violence will be the tipping point that will fast-track the disintegration of Nigeria. Considering the current security situation in Northern Nigeria and the extreme political polarization, this possible outcome to any Nigerian, who is not living in self denial, is not far fetched.
*The incumbent wins the nomination of his party and then loses the election to an opponent from Northern Nigeria.

He concedes defeat, as he promised that he would abide by the outcome of the elections whether favourable to him or not;  his supporters mostly from the Southern Nigeria, especially the Eastern Nigeria, refuse to accept such an outcome and violence erupts.
“The reason being that many supporters of the incumbent President rightly or wrongly believe that any perceived non-performance by the incumbent is as a result of distractions to governance caused largely by the distractions of the Boko Haram insurgency and the polarizing politicisation of the insurgency. And that Boko Haram is the creation of some far North elite, who in the first instance, did not want the incumbent to succeed his deceased principal and threatened to use any means to chase him out of office.
“Now that they have succeeded in chasing out ‘our own person ‘, we shall not allow ‘their own person’ to govern us. We will secede and let the person govern his ‘own people’. That will be the beginning of the end of Nigeria as we currently know it.
”It is very important to bring to the attention of most Nigerians that there is now a fundamental shift in the balance of forces in Nigeria. It is no longer feasible to prevent any major group in Nigeria from seceding if they so wish. The era of fighting to keep Nigeria one by force is gone. Most Nigerians want a united Nigeria but no longer at any cost. Our unity, contrary to the public posturing of some elite is currently very fragile and the common man can feel it.
“We should stop taking the unity of Nigeria for granted. I will like to highlight a recent incident which we Nigerians may ignore at our peril -The attempt by a group of men to take over a radio station at Enugu and declare the coming into existence of a new country named Biafra. That is how Boko Haram started and following the enabling environment created by our actions or inactions, metamorphosed into today’s current monster. There are a sizeable number of Nigerians who at present see no future for themselves in present day Nigeria and if the opportunity presents itself will decide to take control of their own destiny, whatever that may be.
“This is where I foresee the danger in 2015. A disputed Presidential Election result and the eruption of violence from potential disparate very well armed radical underground groups sharing sentiments with groups such as MEND, EGBESU, MASSOB, OPC.
“An enabling environment for the eruption of such violence if combined with the Boko Haram insurgency will be difficult for our presently stretched security forces to contain.
“A successful National Conference will definitely prevent the occurrence of this doomsday scenario and the Southern Professionals are interested in supporting the delegates in anyway feasible to produce the desirable outcome that can lay a solid foundation for a New Nigeria.”
Filename: Southern professionals 16-6-14