Pursuit of Ogoja State is Just on The Realms of Emotions: Ndoma Egba

by crossriverwatch admin

Senate Leader Victor Ndoma-Egba on Wednesday said the requests for the creation of states had raised fears that it might be difficult to create any in the country.

Ndoma-Egba said this at an interactive session with newsmen in Calabar ahead the Peoples’ Public Session on the Review of 1999 Constitution.

According to him, there are 57 requests on state creation before the National Assembly.
He said that for any state to be created the endorsements of no fewer than 24 Houses of Assembly was required.
The senate leader said the creation of more states was possible but that the constitutional provision had made the process cumbersome.

“When we talk of state creation, what I read is emotion.

“What have we done to demand for a state, which other state have we engaged to persuade them to drop their own request to support ours? What step have we taken in that regards.

“No state has come to me to say please tell your people to drop their request for Ogoja state and support ours. Just as I suspected that we have not gone to anywhere to ask for support.

“I don’t see how we can convince 24 states agitators to drop their own request and support ours when they also have their own request pending.

“It is possible to create state. It has nothing to do with me, it is the constitutional provision,’’ he said.

He said “the pursuit of an Ogoja state is just on the realms of emotions, nobody has told me what he or she has done to make sure this demand materialises”.

“I have not seen any state that has done what it takes to have a state.

“In all of the 57 requests, I have not seen one that has done what they need to do to meet the constitutional requirement.’’

He said state creation was a tedious process that required national consensus, noting that the process of consensus building was not going on in the country.