Lagos — Former Chief of Army Staff in the administration of President Shehu Shagari, Lt. General Alani Akinriade, yesterday described the 1999 Constitution as fraudulent and the cause of the democratic woes pervading the Nigerian society today.

Akinrinade, who made this remark while delivering the third "Alaroye lecture," entitled "Yoruba and their Neighbours After 2007," in Lagos, said both President Olusegun Obasanjo and the generality of Nigerians are victims of the Constitution.

He wondered why Nigerian rulers find it difficult to fashion out a constitution that can guarantee true political practice and entrench the principle of revenue derivation, as against the seeming imbibed culture of looting.

"In short, we are all victims of a fraudulent constitution, from President Obasanjo to the Almajeri on the streets of Kano. What is difficult in fashioning out a constitution that could even create more states, prune down the expensive bureaucracy, return to politics of service instead of a profession for looting the treasury?

"What is so difficult in accepting the principles of revenue derivation instead of allocation? Can we not see that the allocation palaver is the principal cause of corruption? When will citizens be returned his responsibilities for taxation and good behaviour that will embolden him to demand good governance and correct behaviour from their government?" he asked.

The former chieftain of the defunct National Democratic Coalition (NADECO), lamented that the constitution is so bad that if Jesus were to become the President of Nigeria and Mohammed as his deputy, on the basis of the 1999 constitution, they would fail, explaining that the situation compelled him to risk blasphemy of that magnitude.

He argued that the concept of true federalism connotes a union of people, guaranteed by one document called the constitution and produced through deliberations and consensus of the people concerned.

"I have reached the conclusion, at the risk of blasphemy, that if you elect a Jesus as the President and a Mohammed as his vice or vice versa and swear them in on this constitution, dubbed the People's Constitution for the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, they can only fail. The people recognize what a federation is, simply a union of constitutions, then which ones? A document of the people. Which people? Nigerians? Who are they? It can only be the authentic representatives of those early empires, kingdoms and fiefdoms as nasty as it may sound, that are entitled to sit and agree to a constitution that may form a new federation of Nigeria."