Authors: Akpandem James and Sam Akpe
Size: 633 pages
Reviewer: Philip Afaha
Publisher: Wordsworth Resources
Year: 2022
The Amalgamation of 1914 by Lord Frederick Lugard brought the Northern and Southern protectorates of Nigeria together, but the 2014 National Conference can be said to be the first genuine attempt at the bringing together of the peoples of Nigeria to proffer solutions to their country’s fault-lines. Although the 2014 exercise was not the first time Nigerians gathered to dialogue about their country, it is widely believed to have been the closest Nigeria came to resolving the problems of her nationhood.
The 2014 National Conference was historic in many aspects. It was the most successful National Conference since independence in 1960. Despite every shortcoming, the Conference brought together a team of rivals as in the case of Abraham Lincoln. Two veteran journalists, Akpandem James and Sam Akpe, who saw action in that conference, decided to put their inks to paper, and that endeavour resulted in the book, “The National Conversation: Interests and Intrigues that Shaped the 2014 National Conference”. The book was conceived to put on record for posterity why President Goodluck Jonathan braced the odds to convene the conference.
Cast in 633 pages, 23 Chapters and published in 2022 by Wordsworth Limited, The National Conversation comes with a silhouette picture of the 2014 Conference as its cover design. The book is a reader’s companion as it conveys, according to Bolaji Akinyemi who wrote its Foreword, a “deep insight of not just what the Conference was about or why it was called, but what actually happened that were not on public display”. It comes complete with an appendix containing the list of delegates by Classification and Regions; List of Committees by Responsibilities and Membership; List of Women; Delegates Who Died during the Conference; President’s Speeches during Inauguration and Closing Ceremony; and Chairman’s Speeches at the Inauguration and Submission of the Conference Report.
According to the authors, the 2014 National Conference almost ended before it started. That means there were so many intrigues bordering on ethnic, religious and political blocs. Most of these intrigues escaped public notice because even the most diligent mainstream media operators could not capture them. Such intrigues needed to be captured and preserved so that we can learn our lessons as a nation.
Written in descriptive prose, The National Conversation chronicles the historic dialogue whose aim, According to Akinyemi, Deputy Chair of the conference, was “to realistically examine...to genuinely resolve long standing hurdles to national cohesion and harmonious development...” Whether this was achieved to the satisfaction of all sections of the country or not is a matter in the public domain.
The focus of this book however, is how certain factors and their complex inter-relations helped shaped the conference outcomes regardless of which you agree with. The writers wanted a book that was reader-friendly – not too bulky but deep enough to convey their message. Akpandem James and Sam Akpe therefore translated their Conference memoirs into three distinct but related sections namely Build-Up Analysis, Issues That Shaped The Conference, And Critical Governance Issues.
Section One: Build-Up Analysis has three chapters. It provides answer to the query as to whether the conference was necessary. There are many reasons that can be adduced for this but chief among them is the question of implementation of critical if substantial resolutions post-conference. Nigeria has had similar national conferences but the implementation of key conference considerations and resolutions post-conference have lagged behind the enthusiasm that initiated the conferences. Nigeria is a country in which “national resolutions” are viewed and evaluated through sectional lenses prior to implementation. The term “marginalisation” is therefore the star-boy of our socio-politico-cultural national lexicon. Because having “nationally resolved to...” why a sectional interest should impede the journey of such a national assignment is perplexing. That is a subject of another book.
However as would be seen in the book, the 2014 national conference resolutions suffered the same fate as was envisaged by its sceptics. Nigeria was at the threshold of another general election and many particularly political opponents saw it as a campaign strategy by the Jonathan administration because even though it was necessary, if it became eventually successful, it will politically benefit the president.
There were other direct pre-conference hurdles, for instance, the nomenclature of the conference itself whether it should be National Dialogue, National Conference, Sovereign Peoples Conference or Sovereign National Conference. Others include the cost, delegates’ selection, timing and other contingencies. The conference main took off on Monday March 17, 2014 with the prime mission “to engage in intense introspection about the political and socio-economic challenges confronting Nigeria and to chart the best and most acceptable way for the resolution of such challenges in the collective interest of all the constituent parts of the country.” These issues include the constitution, issues addressed by past conferences, form and structure of government, devolution of powers, revenue and resource control, state police, local government and state creation, etc. But the oneness and indivisibility of Nigeria was not under discussion.
Section Two has eight (8) chapters and focuses on the dramatis personae and the issues that shaped the conference. It also highlights on the Background, Composition and Representation of the conference delegates as compared to the American Constitutional Convention. Next was Women at the Conference, Conference Rules, Procedures, Voting and the 50 Wise Men Committee, Consensus Groups, Conference Committees and the extra-curricular activities, so to say, that formed part of the conference, even if humorous. In this you would know Mama Market, Mama Diasporaand the respectable Mama Gombe, a woman who eminently qualifies as mother of the nation for the role she played in the National Conference.
Section Three is the largest with twelve chapters, and deals with critical issues that triggered the Conference ab-initio. Those issues include: (1) Devolution of Power and the Issue of Resource Control (2) Politics and Governance of a Beleaguered Entity (3) Political Parties and Electoral Matters (4) National Security: A Critical Governance Subject Matter (5) Religion: Much Ado About Nothing (6) Immunity Clause: To Be or Not To Be (7) Give Us This Day Our State Police (8) The Craze and Crave for State Creation (9) Contentious Land Use Act and Boundary Issues (10) Cattle Routes and Grazing Reserves (11) Revitalising Agriculture and Water Resources (12) People at the Conference: The Forerunners and the Potentates.
CONCLUSION
This book has to be written because the public would be deprived of access to the crucial decisions taken at the National Conference if such decisions were left in official records. This book was dreamt of and executed to put in simple journalistic and understandable terms how these decisions were taken, why they were taken and what the decisions were. What Akpandem James and Sam Akpe did not interrogate in their book, which every Nigerian itches to unravel is, why the resolutions of the 2014 National Conference were never implemented.
There are two stark realities as one flips through these pages: Nigeria knows her problems but lacks the will to resolve them. The second is that constant conversations remain the only saviour for our nationhood. In addition to its numerous advantages, The National Conversation is a loud reminder that Nigerians must keep talking, not at themselves as we have now, but to and with themselves. The National Conversation must continue, respectfully.
• Philip Afaha is the Director, Abuja Leadership Centre, University of Abuja
