Constitution Must Be Owned By Nigerians – Reps Committee

Chairman, House of Representative Committee on Constitution Review, Mr Kingsley Chinda, says it aims at ensuring that Nigerians own their constitution by making input on its amendment.

Chinda spoke during the South-South Centre B Zonal Public Hearing on the amendment of the 1999 constitution in Calabar yesterday.

The South-South Zonal centre B comprises of Cross River, Rivers and Akwa Ibom states.

The chairman, who doubles as the minority leader of the House of Representatives, explained that the idea of the engagement was for the representatives to speak with the people on their concerns on the 1999 constitution.

“We speak for the people but this period, we are speaking with the people who elected us, we want to make our constitution one that is owned by the people.

“And so we have gone to all the zones, having two centers in each zone, to talk to the people on areas they think are necessary for amendment in the constitution.

“In this Centre, we have discussed with the people of Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Cross River and we have gotten their input, we will take it back to the parliament for further deliberations,” he noted.

He said that they expected the input of  the people to be reflected in the amendment that would come out of the constitution.

He said constitution amendment would take place twice within the tenure of the 10th Assembly and assure that between July 19 and the end of 2025, the document would be concluded and sent to state assemblies

Chinda said they would expect the assemblies, after their deliberations, to send it back to them to kickstart the second phase of the amendment be the 10th assembly would be round up

Gov. Bassey Otu of Cross River commended the committee, noting that although it had a difficult task, its work would be historic upon completion.

Otu, represented by his deputy, Mr Peter Odey, said that legislators aim to aggregate and give legislative expression to the desires and views of Nigerians in a way that deepens the Nigerian democracy was timely.( NAN)