SIR: Nigeria had once been a great country in the past ranking very high in most developmental indices, growth and greatness, thanks to a full-blown true federalism that was embraced and was allowed to flourish.

  The good news today is that the country is again on the march to another era of true federalism, the hope that is being rekindled by the current Administration of President Bola Tinubu, going by the signal emerging from some policies and decisions made in just two years of being in the saddle of leadership of Nigeria.

Before dwelling on some invaluable benefits of true federalism, it is pertinent to understanding why the new faith that a new era of true federalism is the horizon and  beckoning by refreshing our memories on some of these recent decisions of this administration that are obvious prelude to this expectation.

  One of such indications was Tinubu’s policy statement on the imperative of state police during his recent visit to Benue State to seek end to the ethno-religious induced killings in parts of the state, where he unequivocally declared that no time is ripe for state police than now.

  Many analysts have also interpreted current moves by the National Assembly to establish Forest Guards in all states of the federation where each state has the authority to recruit only its indigenes into the new outfit, as a step towards the take off of state police.

    Another signal is the administration’s local government autonomy policy, which granted fiscal autonomy to this third tier of government, making them fiscally independent of state governments. This has rectified the anomalous practice in the past where local government officials were hounded into fraudulent Joint Allocation Committees by state governors.  

Of course, Tinubu as governor in Lagos State was the precursor of this idea when he attempted to generate independent power for the state but which the overbearing government of former President Olusegun Obasanjo did not only hijack but crippled it.

    The recent policy giving states the right to establish and construct rail transportation has also been viewed as one of the signals that true federalism is in the offing again in Nigeria. For instance, this is the reason why states in the Southwest under the auspices of Development Agenda for Western Nigeria are making the move to establish rail transportation for the region.

    In the same vein, speculators are upbeat in their permutation that development commissions now established for each region by the federal government is a prelude to true federalism and are basking in the euphoria that they would one day metamorphose into regional governments as it were in the days of old. 

    We believe that true federalism and resource control are critical to Nigeria’s future. By empowering states to manage their resources and promote regional development, we can unlock the full potential of our diverse nation. True federalism will: