Former Minister of Education and prominent activist, Mrs. Obiageli “Oby” Ezekwesili, has called for an urgent restructuring of Nigeria through a single constitutional amendment that would pave the way for a citizens-led sovereign national conference and a referendum on a new constitution.
In a public memorandum addressed to President Bola Tinubu, the National Assembly and the Nigerian people, Ezekwesili argued that the country’s worsening insecurity, governance challenges and socio-economic difficulties are symptoms of a deeper structural crisis rooted in the nation’s constitutional framework.
The former Vice President of the World Bank’s Africa Region maintained that Nigeria’s current constitutional arrangement has become incapable of addressing the complex challenges confronting the country and warned that the nation was approaching a critical point.
“Nigeria is approaching a dangerous precipice,” she stated.
“The insecurity that now defines daily life across vast stretches of our country is not merely a law-and-order problem; it is evidence of a Nation-state whose foundational architecture is no longer fit for purpose.”
According to her, the growing influence of terrorists, bandits and criminal groups in parts of the country demonstrates the extent to which the Nigerian state is struggling to exercise effective authority.
“Terrorists, bandits, and armed criminal networks have entrenched themselves so deeply that they now exercise a form of rival governance, openly contesting the sovereignty of the Nigerian state,” she said.
Ezekwesili, who has long advocated constitutional reforms and governance restructuring, argued that the ongoing debate over state police, though important, does not go far enough in addressing Nigeria’s problems.
She described state police as “necessary, overdue, and ultimately unavoidable,” but insisted that decentralising policing alone would not resolve what she termed a structural national crisis.
“Our national dysfunction is structural, not episodic. No amount of administrative tinkering can repair a constitutional foundation that was defective from inception,” she said.
The former minister criticised the 1999 Constitution, describing it as a document imposed on Nigerians without their direct participation or consent.
According to her, while the constitution provides mechanisms for amendment, it offers no pathway for citizens to replace it entirely, creating what she described as a constitutional deadlock.
“The 1999 Constitution — a document imposed on Nigerians without debate or consent — has trapped the country in a cycle of paralysis,” she argued.
“It provides a pathway for amending itself, but none for replacing itself.”
To address the challenge, Ezekwesili proposed what she called a “Single-Issue Constitutional Amendment” that would legally authorise a citizens-led sovereign national conference tasked with drafting a new constitution.
She explained that the proposed conference would produce a constitutional draft that would subsequently be subjected to a national referendum.
“This is why Nigeria must now pursue a single, urgent reform: a Single-Issue Constitutional Amendment that creates a lawful, binding, and time-bound pathway for a Citizens-Led Sovereign National Conference whose final draft Constitution will be submitted to Nigerians in a referendum,” she said.
Drawing lessons from Kenya’s constitutional transformation process, Ezekwesili argued that Nigeria could learn from the East African country’s experience in using a referendum to address deep-rooted political and ethnic tensions.
“Kenya escaped the abyss of ethnic conflict by using its 2010 referendum to give citizens the power to remake the State — a lesson Nigeria can no longer afford to ignore,” she stated.
The activist noted that the proposal was not intended to undermine constitutional order but rather to utilise the amendment provisions already contained in the existing constitution to create a legitimate process for drafting a new one.
“Such an amendment would not be an act of rebellion against the existing order; it would be an act of fidelity to it,” she said.
By using the current constitution’s amendment procedure to establish a pathway for constitutional replacement, she argued, Nigeria could avoid political instability while granting citizens direct ownership of the nation’s foundational law.
Ezekwesili revealed that the proposal was first submitted by FixPolitics, a governance advocacy organisation she chaired, to the Senate Committee on Constitution Review in 2021.
“The logic remains compelling. Nigeria’s problem is not one broken clause but a broken constitutional architecture. A house built on a faulty foundation cannot be repaired by rearranging the furniture,” she said.
She further proposed that the envisioned sovereign national conference should include representatives of ethnic nationalities, women, youths, labour unions, civil society organisations, persons with disabilities, traditional institutions, faith-based groups, the private sector, diaspora communities and elected officials.
According to her, the process must be transparent, inclusive and accessible to the public, while the final draft constitution must be approved through a referendum.
Ezekwesili also dismissed claims that recent reforms under the Tinubu administration amounted to restructuring, arguing that policy adjustments cannot substitute for comprehensive constitutional reform.
“Piecemal adjustments are not restructuring. They are, at best, administrative conveniences. At worst, they are distractions that obscure the deeper crisis,” she said.
“True restructuring requires a collectively owned, citizen-driven constitutional process — not executive-led policy tweaks that leave the underlying power imbalances intact.”
Calling for civic mobilisation, the former minister urged Nigerians to pressure the National Assembly and state legislatures to support the proposed amendment.
“The National Assembly and State Houses of Assembly must therefore be called upon — through collective civic action — to pass one urgent amendment: the amendment that returns constitution-making authority to the people,” she stated.
She stressed that Nigerians should focus on securing a single constitutional amendment rather than pursuing multiple amendments that fail to address the core issues.
“Not many amendments. Not cosmetic amendments. Not amendments that pretend to restructure Nigeria on behalf of the people.
“Just one: the amendment that empowers Nigerians to restructure Nigeria for themselves.”
Ezekwesili warned that Nigeria could face even deeper instability if it continues to operate under what she described as an over-centralised constitutional system.
“Our condition is dire. Our window is narrowing,” she said.
“The insecurity that now engulfs the country is not merely a failure of policing; it is the predictable outcome of a constitutional order that concentrates power without accountability, centralizes authority without capacity, and imposes unity without consent.”
She concluded by urging Nigerians to seize what she described as a historic opportunity to reset the nation and determine its future through collective action.
“Now is the next best time to reset Nigeria since independence,” she said.
“The answer, dear compatriots, is in our hands because, as the GenZs would say, Nigeria desperately needs those who will step up to ‘carry her matter for their heads’.”