Member representing Bende federal constituency, Hon. Benjamin Kalu has called for the creation of additional one state in the South East region of the country to be at per with other regions of the state that have at least six states each.
This is his submission during the weekly radio programme, Ben Kalu’s Mandate monitored by ABN TV on Tuesday.
While calling on South East leaders to lend a voice to this call, Hon. Kalu who is spokesperson of the House of Representative called on the Constitution Review Committee to give this request the needed thought.
While maintaining that the region has the capacity to shoulder additional one state, the federal lawmaker noted that the opportunity of the Constitution review is the most veritable one to allow South East have the same number of states with other geopolitical zones.
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He said, “We are being shortchanged in the South East in the sense that other geo-political zones in the country have six states in each of the zones. It is only in the South East that we have five states.
“As a member of the parliament, if I don’t address it now, I wonder when I will address it. My call to the Constitution Review Committee is that they consider it because it is from this process that states would be created.
“They should consider the possibility of increasing the number of states from five to six. I say so because it affects the distribution of democracy in a very significant way.
“Why should some regions get above the others? These are the reasons for some of these agitations, talking about equity and justice. It is time to balance the equation and I believe that the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria will give that to the South East as a gift.
“This is my way of raising a call through this program that South East cannot remain as five states, The South East is bigger enough to contain 6 states so that when we go for our federal allocation and other dividends of democracy, we will not have less while others have more.
“I am calling on all leaders in the South East irrespective of party affiliation to rise up and ask for six states in the South East so that the equation will be balanced.
“We are not representing our people well if we cannot push this request. Let us all join our voices to this, it is not about carrying placards, however following the legislative process. It is the right thing to do, and leaving the right thing undone when it ought to be done, is in itself an injustice.’
