With rampant complaints about imperfections in the Nigerian constitution, and the notion that it is a military imposition, the National Assembly has begun an unprecedented process of trying to give the people a constitution they can call their own. Vincent Obia looks at the first steps in the process
Nigeria has witnessed an epidemic of grievances about its structure and operation since the return to civil rule in 1999. The history of the country has, of course, been described as the history of strained union, dating back to the amalgamation of disparate peoples in 1914 by the British colonialists. But 16 years of autocracy during the country's longest military interregnum seemed to set a higher tone for agitations at the dawn of democracy in 1999.
...