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The Buhari/Osinbajo Campaign Organisation in Gombe State
has decried the expensive nature of the country’s presidential system of
governance and wants a return to the parliamentary system.
The organisation made this known in a memo submitted
before the All Progressives Congress (APC) Committee on Restructuring
Nigeria in Bauchi. The memo was signed by Engr. A. Abdullahi, and a copy
of it was made available to Daily Sun, on Wednesday.
The group maintained that even though those agitating and
clamouring for restructuring of Nigeria failed to proffer cogent reasons
for their clamour, there was still the need to revisit the country’s
system of government.
The group maintained that the current presidential system
was over-bearing in terms of cost and overwhelming in terms of personnel
who mostly are political aides.
According to the campaign organisation, the presidential
system imposes a heavy financial burden on government and leaves little
for development of infrastructure.
The group, therefore, proposed a return to the parliamentary system of government as an alternative.
“This is observed to be less expensive and more
encompassing. It operates a unicameral legislature, ensuring that a
minister must first be a member of parliament,” the statement explained.
On the issue of devolution of powers, the Buhari/Osibanjo
campaign organisation equally decried the skewedness of the Nigerian
constitution particularly regarding the exclusive list, which favours
the federal government.
It proposed for the some of the items on the list to be handed over the states and to become part of the concurrent list.
While the organisation wants the federal government to
retain defence, foreign affairs, national planning, telecommunication,
petroleum and natural resources, they recommended for the powers of the
federal government to be whittled down.
“While the powers of the federal government is being
devolved, correspondingly the budgetary allocation of government should
be reduced and that of the states and local governments be increased in
similar proportion,” the group said.