“There is no provision in the constitution which prohibits referendum either; so if it doesn’t prohibit it, why can’t we do it. It cannot be illegal.
“The constitution doesn’t say we can pray and have breakfast but we still do it.
“So, the constitution doesn’t have to tell you everything you have to do as long as it does not prohibit it,” he said.
Sagay, nonetheless, rejected the notion that the recommendations should not be sent to the National Assembly, saying that the legislature was only established to amend constitutional provisions and not to introduce a new constitution.
“The recommendations should not be sent to the National Assembly because it does not have the capacity to change our law in such a fundamental way.
“The power it has is only to alter some provisions of the constitution but where you have fundamental changes, it should be done through referendum. We should go for a new constitution,” he said.
On the other hand, Mr Jibrin Okutepa, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), suggested that the recommendations should be sent to National Assembly, which would consider them and pass a bill that would be forwarded to the president to sign into law.
He, however, stressed that the recommendations could not be subjected to a referendum, as there was no provision for referendum in the constitution.
“If the recommendations are forwarded to the National Assembly; fine, but if they are to be sent to the people for referendum, under which law are you sending them to the people?
“Maybe the long and short of it could be that the president will collate the views and put them in the form of a bill and constitutional draft,’’ he said.
Okutepa said that a draft copy of the recommendations could also be sent to the National Assembly, which would pass a law adopting it as part of the constitution.
He said that another option was to jettison the outcome of the conference and “allow it to go into the dustbin of history like every other constitutional conference held before now.”
Sharing similar sentiments, Mr Odion Odia, a human rights lawyer, argued that there was no need to subject the outcome of the conference to a referendum.
He said that since the conference was not able to reach consensus on derivation and resource control, which other recommendations hinged on, going for a referendum would be needless.
He suggested that the recommendations should be forwarded to the National Assembly and made part of ongoing efforts to amend the constitution.
“There is no need to subject the outcome of the conference to referendum. At best, they should be sent to the National Assembly, which could make it part of the constitution’s amendment currently going on, “he said.
Odia expressed disappointment at the manner in which the conference ended its plenary session, adding that it was needless referring the issues of derivation and resource control to the Federal Government.
“The conference did not end well because it failed on the most important issue, and that is derivation and resource control.
“Now that they have sent it back to the President, who constituted the conference. In my opinion, they have failed.
“I am not unaware that the confab reached about 600 resolutions but they are not as important as the ones they were not able to resolve,” he added.
Odia stressed that if the delegates failed to reach consensus on an important issue like derivation and resource control, particularly at a time when the country was facing security challenges, there was no need for a referendum.
Nevertheless, Mr Rafiu Salau, the National Secretary Alliance for Democracy (AD) urged the National Assembly to amend the constitution to make provision for a referendum to deliberate on the recommendations of the conference.
“Our legislators should ensure that referendum is part of the constitution to enable the people they represent to make input into national issues.
“In a democracy, the people are the masters and referendum is one of the ways to really prove that notion,” he said.
Salau explained that subjecting the recommendations to a referendum would ensure that the Federal Government efforts in organising the conference would not be in vain.
Prof Abdulhameed Ujo of the Department of Political Science and International Relations, University of Abuja, rejected calls for a referendum to approve or reject the recommendations, insisting that there was no provision for referendum in the constitution.
