National Confab: CISLAC wants federal, state governments’ nominees reduced

A coalition of pro-democracy civil society organisations on Wednesday called on the Federal Government to reduce the number of nominees allocated to the federal and state governments in the proposed national conference.
The call was contained in a statement issued in Abuja and signed by Malam Auwal Rafsanjani, the Executive Director, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre.
It would be recalled that the Federal Government had released modalities for convening the conference.
The government is proposing 492 delegates, of which 46 will be nominated by the President, 108 by governors, one by the FCT and 26 by the Federal Government.
“We demand that the number of federal and state government nominees in the proposed national conference should be reduced and a larger number of delegates should be allotted to pro-democracy civil society movement,” CISLAC urged.
The coalition demanded that a greater proportion of not less than two-thirds of delegates should be allocated to the independent non-state actor representatives.
The group also suggested that outcome of the conference should be subjected to the validation of Nigerians in a referendum.
It said: “We suggest that two months into the three-month conference, there should be a break to enable delegates to report back to their constituents and revalidate the mandates they were given.”
The pro-democracy outfit stressed the need for all Nigerian citizens to actively participate in the conference by organising regional, state and pan-communal delegates conferences to aggregate the positions and demands of the people.