President Goodluck Jonathan, standing next to the Guards Brigade Commander, waves to the crowds after his inauguration in May
From the historical point of view, the cantons came first. ”Thus the Swiss state was not artificially decentralised, but built
up from below [like their watches!]. In the USA, the emphasis lies on the decentralisation of the public power, in Switzerland it is rather on the independence of the canton. “Since finally, the racial, linguistic, religious and other
differences within the people are not, as in America, the product of immigration, and largely coincide with cantonal [ethnic] frontiers, there is no feeling of need for assimilation. On the contrary, a higher interest demands that each part of the country should preserve its individuality. In the National Council, as also, for that matter, in the Council of States, every member can speak in his mother tongue.” Hans Huber rounds up his analysis of the workings of the Swiss democratic model with this: “Democracy [in Switzerland] is less of an outward show and more of a mental activity.” This brings me back nicely to the Nigerian watchmaker. I accept
that it may not be possible in the lifetime of my reader for the political class to get Nigeria to the point of manufacturing watches
like the Swiss, but is it really too much to ask for them to organise our political space on the Swiss model? Is it not time for them to move from wearing watches on their
wrists to making the observance of time a mental activity so as to appreciate that after 50 years of independence, we are back almost where we started, with the South West, the core North, and the South East (now with the Middle Belt) under separate political parties? Is it not time for us to move beyond the outward show of democracy, with elections and all their razzmatazz, to making democracy a mental activity by way of a genuine federal arrangement that allows the people in each component part to run according to their own value systems and priorities, whether Boko is Haram or not? The Federalists are clear in their answers to these questions as
they have always been but, as the Boko Haram menace grows daily, the clock is ticking for the Unitarists. Do I hear anything more than Kashimawo? (Dele Ogun is the author of The Law, the Lawyers and the Lawless.)
New African | October 2011 | 77
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