The group, which was christened, ‘Initiative for National Consensus,” according to its handlers, was borne out of genuine desire to ensure that no part of the recommendations agreed upon and adopted by the delegates, was thrown into dustbin by the government.
Confab: From left, Mr Christian Udechukwu, Chief Dan Nwanyanu, Chief Victor Umeh and Senator Ike Nwachukwu discussing during National Conference in Abuja . Photo by Gbemiga Olamikan
Members of the group, led by its interim coordinator and leader of Ondo State delegation to the conference, Mr. Remi Olatubora, while briefing newsmen shortly their inauguration session at the confab venue, yesterday, insisted that their desire to come together in a group was informed by common desire of most delegates that all relevant governmental organs and agencies implement the decisions of the conference in totality.
Olatubora, who is also a serving Commissioner for Adult and Vocational Education in his home state, explained that their decision to form the group was mostly informed by past experiences where recommendations and reports of previous exercises were left to gather dust.
He said that the group would work together as advocacy group towards ensuring that “decisions of the conference were not left in the shelf to gather dust in the manner in which the reports of earlier conferences were treated.”
The group’s membership cuts across the six geo-political zones, comprises representatives of youths, academia, lawyers, politicians, Civil Society Organisations, CSOs, religious bodies, Nigerian Union of Journalists, NUJ and the Diaspora, among others.
Olatunbora said the mission of the group was to engage with issues flowing from the confab, as independent input into the process of consolidating the gains of Nigeria’s centenary, and its reconstruction into a responsible, accountable, and egalitarian society.
Other reasons according to him was “to campaign vigorously for gender mainstreaming and inter-generational justice as dedicated by the requirement of 21 century politics.”
Some of the objectives of the group, according to Olatubora, were “to develop a framework for the emergence of an alumni of the confab as the broadest convergence of pan-Nigerian constituent group and to act as a connecting rod between our group and the primary as well as secondary stakeholders in the sustainability of Nigeria project.”