Constitution: Nigerians Reject Rotational Presidency, Immunity, State Police

Nigerians have rejected the inclusion of rotational presidency, immunity for the President and governors as well as state police in the ongoing amendments to the 1999 Constitution.
They also kicked against the clamour for resource control by oil producing communities and the call to raise the derivation principle from the current 13 per cent to 20 per cent.
These views were in the collated results of their views on the amendment, made public by the House of Representatives in Abuja on Thursday.
The results came from the People’s Public Sessions conducted in the 360 Federal Constituencies on November 10, 2012 by its Ad-Hoc Committee on Constitution Review.
The committee, headed by the Deputy Speaker of the House, Mr. Emeka Ihedioha, produced a 43-item template for the public sessions, drawn from the memoranda submitted to it by many individuals and interest groups in the country.
According to the results, Nigerians neither want the presidency to rotate between the North and the South nor between the six geopolitical zones.
On a question, “Should a provision be inserted in the constitution for the rotation of the Office of the President between the Northern and Southern parts of the country”, 80 constituencies voted ‘Yes’, while 275 voted ‘No’. Five were undecided, making 360.