The Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Representatives on Constitution Review has approved the establishment of an additional state in the Southeast region to address the long-standing agitation over what is perceived as the region’s marginalisation within Nigeria’s political structure.
The resolution was adopted during the committee’s two-day retreat held in Lagos from October 24 to 25.
The committee, chaired by the Deputy Senate President, Barau Jibrin, and co-chaired by the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu, held extensive discussions on the long-standing call for a sixth state in the South-East.
It also reviewed a broad range of proposed constitutional amendments, including 55 separate requests for the creation of new states across the country.
Speaking to journalists after the meeting, Senator Osita Izunaso (APC, Imo West), a member of the committee, described the decision as “a right step in the right direction”, emphasising that it would help to reduce the persistent sense of exclusion felt in the South-East.
“The most important of all the approvals that we have gotten is that we have agreed today to give an additional state to the South-East to balance it six-six states per geo-political zone, regardless of the North-West, which has seven states.
“We have set up another committee to look at modalities to create more states for areas that need more states. These are the things that we have achieved today. An additional state for South-East is a major achievement of this final retreat of the National Assembly Constitution Review Committee,” he said.
