Follow-up To "Letter To The Church In Nigeria: From Balanced Ticket To Balanced Federation" Published In May 2025.
The manipulation of electoral timetables to accommodate religious observances is not a trivial administrative adjustment. It is a Constitutional warning: a secular republic is being bent to the compass of faith.
If we allow the scheduling of the 2027 elections to be changed because one religion’s calendar might coincide with polling, we will have surrendered an essential principle, to wit: that religion must not dictate state policy.
The National Assembly’s recent decision to amend the Electoral Act timetable, explained publicly by Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele on the grounds that holding elections during Ramadan “could adversely affect voter turnout, logistical coordination, stakeholder engagement and the overall inclusiveness and credibility of the electoral process” and “concerns raised by some Muslim stakeholders who demanded that the elections be shifted to avoid coinciding with Ramadan” makes the point for us: the stage is now set for subordinating the secular calendar of the state to religious obligation.
If this is allowed to stand, the door opens to a future where any religious group with political leverage can ask for state timetables, laws, and resources to be remade in its image.
That would be the antithesis of secularism. The 1999 Constitution, for all its many faults, explicitly proclaims Nigeria a secular state. That phrasing is not decorative; it is the single most important safeguard that prevents one set of religious requirements from becoming public law.
Hence, we submit as follows:
(i) The justification implies Nigeria is an Islamic country. It is not. It is a Secular country as the 1999 Constitution says, despite its many faults. To shift an already decided electoral calendar because of one religion is a direct affront to the proclaimed Secularity, which naturally implies that any religious obligation must not interfere with State Policy.
The favorite mantra of the politicians during any religious obligation is to harp on “religious harmony”. Yet religious harmony can only occur in a Secular Society. Once a religious obligation becomes an influencer of State Policy, harmony disappears. The consequence is not harmony but a struggle for hegemony. The first casualty is the very harmony the politicians claim to cherish. Religious peace does not arise from bending the state to the current demands of any faith. On the contrary, religious harmony is possible only when the state remains neutral: when public institutions treat all faiths, and non-faith, equally.
This is why a new, Secular, Federal, Ethno-National Constitution becomes imperative. It favors Christians Traditionalists, Muslims and others, including atheists.
Nationalities will be able to address their religious diversities. No one religion can or will be able to hold the entire society to ransom.
Hence, what we need to do is to compel the National Assembly to review the entire electoral construct, and by extension, the entire 1999 Constitution with its hand-over dates and schedule elections to any period outside any religious obligation. And such a schedule would be permanent. Everyone will be aware of this social obligation, ab initio. The National Assembly has simply set the stage for future adjustments based on religious preferences, especially when it is known that these religious obligations have no fixed or permanent dates.
(ii) We are all aware of the serial "alterations" to the 1999 Constitution with no improvement on its ability to address Nigeria's existential issues, hence the same rigmarole every four years. The 1999 Constitution has been amended many times; the process has produced no structural solution to Nigeria’s existential crisis. Amendments and tinkering have not made the federation fairer, safer, or more prosperous. The cycle repeats: four years of contest, two months of campaigning, appeals to identity, and then the renewal of grievances.
(iii) This is the major reason for this call to boycott the 2027 elections and utilize the intervening period to prepare a new Constitution under which any new elections would be held. This new Constitution is to address the fundamental and deliberate failure of the 1999 Constitution to recognize the Peoples of Nigeria as Federating Units. This major flaw is the reason the Constitution and any State Policy arising therefrom are suddenly and always beholden to "stakeholders" who are not even recognized by the Constitution itself. Unless we are now being told that the states, recognized as “Federating Units” are the stakeholders demanding the recalibration of elections to suit their religious obligations? But we also know that there is no state with an official religion. Hence the stakeholders refer to the Peoples, in this instance, the Muslims.
(iv) This being the case, how about Christian stakeholders? At this point, we need to remind ourselves that this affront against Secularism began with the introduction and implementation of Sharia Laws by 12 Northern States. The then President, Olusegun Obasanjo ignored the warnings about its implications, relegating it to “politics”-- whichever way he defined it hence it was easy to classify his lackadaisical attitude as inconsequential. However, events since then have shown that his attitude was more of pandering to Islamist interests, going by the steady and continuous rise of Islamic terrorism since then, up till the current situation in the country where the Central Government is helpless in confronting terrorism, renamed “banditry” by the Muhammadu Buhari Administration and continuing till date. Yet, as helpless as the Central Government is, state governors in the “12 Sharia States” have no compunction negotiating with these Islamist terrorists.
(v) The eventual response of the Christian community to the creeping de-secularization of Nigeria was to object to the “Muslim-Muslim Ticket” during the 2023 elections, apparently forgetting that every administration before 2023 had been religiously “balanced”, to wit; “Christian-Muslim” or “Muslim-Christian” with no corresponding reduction in continued pandering to steady Islamization. Indeed, Islamization steadily increased with each administration. Which means the problem was and is not about a “Balanced Ticket” but about a “Balanced Federation”.
(vi) As stated in our “Letter to the Church” in May 2025:
“The Church must now move from advocating for religious balance in politics to demanding a Balanced Federation based on the recognition of Nigeria’s Indigenous Nationalities. It must now shift its focus from religious parity on election issues to Constitutional justice for Nigeria's Nationalities. It is not enough to seek symbolic inclusion in a broken system. The Church must push for Constitutional Restructuring through Nationality Referendums, the only viable path to justice, peace, and development. The Christian community must rally not around candidates, but around a cause: the Re-Federalization of Nigeria through Nationality Referendums.”
(vii) The 2027 elections and the pandering by the National Assembly mandates a new Constitutional Order. The “Church” is not short of Restructuring advocates. Pastors Tunde Bakare and Paul Adefarasin are good examples.
Both have raised fundamental questions about nationhood and dignity. These questions, to wit: “Who is a Nigerian? Under what terms should diverse groups coexist?” raised by Pastor Bakare and Pastor Adefarasin declaring that “Nigeria was not created by God but by British colonialists” are not rhetorical. They demand answers that only a new Constitution can supply. The proper response is not to defer to the political convenience of the moment, but to mobilize a clear Constitutional pathway that allows Nigerians to answer these questions for themselves.
(viii) We believe this is the time to provide the answer.
Pastor Adefarasin's declaration is well known in Nigeria so there is no need to dwell on it.
To the question: “Who is a Nigerian”? We answer: Nigeria is a country of multiple Peoples and cultures brought together by the British.
Hence a “Nigerian” is one or a combination of that multiplicity.
Which the 1999 Constitution denied and neutralized by not recognizing them as Federating Units. For, if Nigeria is a Federation, and it is or supposed to be, we must know who the Federators are.
(ix) This is why 2027 is crucial. This is why the “Nigeria Question” must be answered by Nigerians. This is why the Nigerians must determine “under what terms should the diverse groups within our borders coexist.”
These terms are to be decided by the Federating Units/groups through the instrumentality of Nationality or Ethno-National Referendums– the only valid, legal and Legitimate way to arrive at coexistence.
(x) Since the National Assembly has deemed it fit to accommodate Muslim stakeholders, nothing stops it from accommodating Christian stakeholders demanding a new Secular Federal Constitution through Ethno-National/Nationality Referendums.
This will be the alternative to Christians’ apprehensions about a “Balanced Ticket”.
If the government and the National Assembly are prepared to adjust the electoral architecture to address religious concerns, then they must be prepared equally to answer the corresponding Constitutional demand: recognize the peoples of this land as Federating units and enshrine secular Federalism in a new Constitution. If they refuse that answer, citizens have a right and an obligation to withhold consent from a process that undermines secular order through boycotting the 2027 elections.
(xi)This call for a boycott is not in isolation and not for its own sake. It is the anchor for the demand for a new Constitutional Order. It is a call to all who desire a Truly Secular Republic just as we desire a Truly Federal Republic– Christians, Muslims, Traditionalists, Atheists and all in-between.
Pastors Bakare and Adefarasin are enjoined to give this suggestion a thorough review and join others in pressurizing our politicians to accede to the demands for Nationality/Ethno-National Referendums.
This will ensure we stop competing over tokens and start collaborating on structural reform. Symbolic wins do not create durable justice. What will secure peace and development is a Constitutional framework that recognizes the plural foundations of the country and distributes power accordingly.
(xii) We stand at a crossroads. The terms we accept now will shape the country for generations. If Nigeria is to remain a Secular republic that respects its multiplicity, then the time for a new Constitutional order is not some distant rhetorical promise: it is now. Those who value secularism, Federal justice, and the integrity of the state must act together to demand nothing less.
Editorial Board
Yoruba Referendum Committee.