Unic Press UK: One of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) apparatchiks and the current Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremmadu, said the idea of restructuring is grossly misunderstood, and that efforts at fiscal decentralization and to restructure Nigerian onto a fiscal federalism are undermined by fears of the potential outcomes.
Senator Ekweremmadu, who delivered a lecture on ‘Restructuring’, during The 3rd Edition of the Adada Lecture Series organized by the Association of Nsukka Professors (ANP), which was held on Friday, the 15th December 2017, at the Princess Alexandria Auditorium and Unity Hall, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, said:
“There is a gross misunderstanding of restructuring. There is the problem of political and ethno-sectional interests and sentiments. There is the fear of abuse of a decentralized police system. There is the fear of losing perceived advantages. Above all, there is the fear of survival under fiscal federalism. Some feel they are better off with free money from Abuja, which could actually be pittances compared to what they could generate if they begin to access bountiful wealth, such as solid minerals buried in their soils.” (Ekweremmadu: 2017)
