Enaharo calls for national conference

Joining the chorus of voices demanding a national conference, veteran Nigeria politician Anthony Enahoro called on Monday for political and economic reshaping of the country.

"The future lies in Nigeria becoming a union of nationalities," he told an audience of some 5,000 in a Lagos ceremony marking his return from self-imposed exile in the United States.

The country's current constitution "imposed" by the military, he said, failed to recognise the divergent nationalities among the country's 120 million people and some 200 ethnic groups. His return, he added, was in "expectation that the grounds have been cleared for the debate".

A political analyst, Godwin Obani of Ogun State, told IRIN "Ninety-nine percent of Nigerians clamouring for federalism and confederation are in support of what he says."

Enahoro's political pull comes from his influence as one of Nigeria's pro-independence activists in the 1953. Today the call for a national conference, to correct seeming inequities among the national groups inherited at independence, have also been articulated by figures such as Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka.

Obani said the federal government, which has steadfastly refused to hold the conference, could not ignore grassroots agitation demanding the meeting. With NGO's educating the public on their rights, he added,holding the conference was "just a matter of time".