Constitution review: Reps spurn states creation, abolish SIECs

The House of Representatives Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution has turned down the request for the creation of more states in Nigeria.
The committee, which received 35 requests for the creation of new states, said that none met the stipulated requirements.
The committee, according to its Chairman and Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, said it found out that even the provisions in the constitution in the first place for the creation of new states was ambiguous.
According to Ihedioha in his speech on Thursday at the presentation of the report to the House, the committee had to clarify the process to make it more coherent.
He said: “The Committee received requests for creation of States running into more than thirty-five (35) States.
“None of the requests submitted to the Committee complied with the procedure for creation of States outlined in section 8 of the Constitution.
“Accordingly, the Committee was unable to treat any of these requests.
“The Committee however recognizes that the existing provision in the Constitution for the creation of new States is unclear and cumbersome.
“Accordingly, the Committee has clarified the process to make it more coherent.”
Ihedioha also hinted that the constitution review committee advocated the scrapping of the State Independent Electoral Commissions, which oversees the conduct of local government areas elections.
He said the commissions were largely seen as biased.
Hence the committee decided to reside the powers for the conduct of all elections in the country in the Independent National Electoral Commission.
Watch out for the full speech of Ihedioha and the detailed proposed amendments shortly.