The students said that the present centralised system where power resides solely in Abuja retards development and aggravates insecurity situations in Nigeria.

The students made their feeling known during a live discussion on the state of civic participation and engagement in Nigeria, yesterday.

The event tagged, StepUpTheCON, a project by Garfield TV with the support of the Open Society Initiative for West Africa, OSIWA, engage students on the issue of electoral reforms in the country after the 2019 elections.

One of the students from the Institute of Management and Technology, IMT Enugu, Miss Chinenye Ogbodo said “the centralised government is not working, it should be decentralized so that states could control their resources and security.

“The power at the centre should be made weak, the President should not have overriding powers on states to run their affairs.”

Other students at the event took turns to discuss the issues of governance and electoral reforms.

Programme manager at Gatefieldtv, Stanley Igyuh noted that the idea behind the StepUpTheCon project was to raise the consciousness and involvement of young people through conversations.

He said that the conversations will help to shape the country’s electoral processes and post-electoral issues, including accountability and civic engagement.

“The elections are over and hence, the need to creatively develop and deliver highly engaging new media content and programming that would excite and sustain the interest, involvement and engagement of young Nigerians on issues of democratic governance, the importance of value building and participation in the democratic process,” Igyuh said.