The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has rejected a bill proposing a single six-year term for the President and State Governors.
The Association condemned it as anti-democratic and an attempt to limit people’s freedom of choice.
Recall that 35 House members, led by Reformed Legislators, filed a bill last week calling for a single six-year term for the President and state governors.
Legislators also proposed rotating the presidency among the country’s six geopolitical zones.
NANS responded by calling on Nigerians to mobilise against the law.
At a news conference in Abeokuta, Ogun State, on Thursday, the National Clerk of the Senate of NANS, Yekini Adewale, called the bill “a smokescreen.”
He claimed that the government was attempting to deflect Nigerians’ attention away from the current economic sufferings and agonies that they are experiencing.
The top student body threatened to mobilise students across the country in a protest against the bill.
He said, “Adewale said that if the bill is passed into law, it would erode accountability, probity, transparency and responsibility on the part of political leaders.
“Yes, democracy thrives on the pedestal of a synergy between the three arms of government, but when a key arm, such as the legislature, proposes bills and peradventure passes laws that stifle people’s choices or throw spanners in the wheel of the tenets of democracy, then, it is disheartening and must not be allowed.
“NANS, as a non-governmental organisation and the only pressure group that has been agitating for the continued survival and sustainability of our hard-earned democracy from being truncated, does not only condemn the proposed bills, but call on Nigerians to move against such step aimed at achieving a selfish agenda by some unscrupulous politicians.
“If the proposed bills are allowed to see the light of the day, then, our democracy is in total jeopardy.
“Any president or governor who realises that he cannot seek a second term in office, may rather busy himself feathering his own neat instead of delivering good governance to the electorate.
“Expunging the second term from our constitution is synonymous to extinguishing the only power the electorate has to vote out any non-performing president or governor.
“As a student body in the country, we shall mobilise our members massively against these bills seeking to efface accountability, probity, transparency and responsibility from the elected executives and lawmakers.
“To further demonstrate our rejection of these anti-democratic, anti-people and anti-progress bills, a day will be set aside for Nigerian students to embark on a mass march against the National Assembly.”