Ohanaeze canvasses new constitution for Nigeria

TRACKING___Ohanaeze Ndigbo has declared that Nigeria required a new constitution and not the routine review of the 1999 Constitution.

On the 1999 Constitution review exercise by the National Assembly, the deputy national publicity secretary of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chuks Ibegbu said that the 1999 Constitution was a military document and not a people’s document.

Ibegbu, who made this position known in a press release made available to journalists in Enugu yesterday, similarly insisted that the position of the group with regard to general insecurity in the country remained that Ndigbo should establish operation ‘Ogbunigwe’ as a regional security outfit.

He said that Ohanaeze’s understanding of community policing was that the various states or geopolitical zones would be allowed to set up their security outfits which would work in conjunction with other government’s security agencies.

He said: “The 2014 National Confab report and the report of past Conferences including the El Rufai Committee report need to bedissected and used to build a people’s constitution, an enduring one.

“We still maintain our position that what our people want is Operation Ogbunigwe which is also community policing in Igbo land.”

Ibegbu indicated that the tag for community policing in Igbo land was Operation Ogbunigwe and governments of the South-East needed a common networking to make the Operation succeed, noting that the people were not afraid of anybody and capable of defending themselves against marauders of any type.

Ibegbu thanked the Inspector General of Police and the South-East Governors for the synergy they were building on the issue, expressing the hope such will continue.

On the modalities for the operation, Ibegbu noted that the Governors are expected to meet with Ohanaeze Ndigbo to work out the blueprint and modalities even though the states in the zone already had one form of security platform or another.

“We want a regional outfit, hence the Operation Ogbunigwe (regional community policing),” Ibegb concun