Press Release. By: National Association Of River South-East Students(NARSES) WorldWide ZONING AND THE PRINCIPLE OF FAIR PLAY, EQUITY AND JUSTICE Zoning or if you like Power Shifting is the mechanism of uniting various diverse people while the political parties are the vehicle for realizing democracy. Party politics and zoning/power shift are two very important elements of any liberal democracy that no one can brush aside with a wave of hand in a primordial state like Rivers State. The call to abolish zoning in Rivers State seriously under estimates and ignores the complex political character with different senatorial districts in the State. The issue of zoning in party politics date back to the Second Republic when National Party of Nigeria (NPN) operated the zoning formula as a strategy for the reunification of the country after the civil war. Zoning is the art of shifting or sharing political offices to various geo-political zones or districts in a bid to balance the political equation. The rotation of political offices was designed, orchestrated and schemed towards curbing the hues, cries and agitation of MAGINALIZATION by some geo- political zones or districts and to bring a lasting peace and stability in our polity. Rivers State is a heterogeneous state with diverse political districts so I think power shift or zoning as the case may be is the only way forward for our amiable state because of our different senatorial districts. When the North under the military regime held power for too long the South cried marginalization and if you say that rotation is not needed, if the South holds power for too long on the basis of credible leadership the North will feel schemed out and will cry foul and vice versa. So to balance our differences, to settle our heterogeneity, and our ties to different political districts, zoning still remains the best for our country and states in particular. It is true that zoning of the office of the President or Governor is not constitutional; but it is in the constitution of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that propounded it. I refer to the PDP Constitution, Article 7 subsection 1(c ) which states that “In pursuance of the principles of equity, justice and fairness, the party shall adhere to the policy of rotation and zoning of party and public elective offices, and it shall be enforced by the appropriate executive committee at all levels” (PDP constitution, 1998). Event has also proven zoning as reality in the scheme of things in the party. For instance the office of the Party Chairman is subject to zoning. Below shows how power sharing arrangement in PDP has been since 1998. The cries of Confederation; Resource Control and Sovereign National Conference is all borne out of diversities in ethnicity. The best way to maintain our unity in a diversified senatorial districts is to rotate power between various senatorial districts in the state. Unity in diversity is our nature; it is in our culture, our language and disposition. Therefore let us not allow any politician out of greed, over ambition or selfishness to manipulate, pervert, subvert or compromise this golden rule of zoning. But rather, respect the zoning principle which is based on equity and justice. If we understand this, we will have no problem. Based on these facts, and for the promotion of peace and stability, fairness and equity NARSES is appealing to political parties to ensure their gubernatorial candidate is from Rivers South-East Senatorial district. Let us promote unity in diversity in Rivers State, with zoning, the cries for marginalization will be led to rest. There will be peace and political stability in the state. Regionalism and Sectionalism is natural in our polity and it is to create peaceful co-existence, mutual understanding, rapid development and societal changes in all the senatorial districts. Lets do what is right by accepting the demand of the Rivers South-East Senatorial District to achieve Equity, Justice and Fairness in the policy. Signed: Comr. Yamaabana Legborsi Coordinator, NARSES WorldWide Facebook/narsesworldwide
Posted on: Fri, 12 Sep 2014 18:05:28 +0000
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