Nigeria, April 16 -- In the study of federalism in political science, the basic knowledge is that federal societies develop into federal states when they agree on the basis of a constitution they have negotiated to share power in a way that no component feels marginalised or excluded. In Nigeria, the 1951 Macpherson's Constitution was adopted on the basis of an elite consensus. The regional elites were suspicious of each other, had no trust in the other and therefore decided that federalism is the best collective protection for all of them. As has been explained:
"True Federalism implies power sharing, abandoning the notion of any one group dominating all the others, not secession but building interdependence. But we need to work hard on i...