Former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Olisa Agbakoba, has said that Western style of democracy has failed in Nigeria.

Speaking on Channels Television programme, Politics Today, Agbakoba said Nigeria needs a homemade model that would consider the country’s diversity and interests. He said: “This is not the Nigeria I dreamt about and I thought that things would have been better than what we have today.

And I have looked at it very carefully and say something must be wrong after 25 years of democratic rule. Let’s go back to 1960, we had military coups in and out and then finally democracy in 1999. “Something is fundamentally wrong in a process that is not delivering.

I like the way Peter Obi summarized it because he got it absolutely spot on. If you ask Nigerians right now, who would you want to vote for, they would just tell you that they want to vote for food in our tummies, good schools, good roads, pay us our salaries on time, housing and the things that make them comfortable. “Nigerians are not really interested in who is the president. They are interested in a president who will deliver.

That’s why it is necessary to be sure that you have a president. But in my reflections and I have reflected quite a lot, I just came to a conclusion that it is time to shield ourselves of this Western model that the Europeans and Americans have foisted on us. It is not working. “We need to ask ourselves if the Western model is good for Nigeria but I don’t think it is suited for us.

Look at China, it is undemocratic but things are working and China is today moving the world because of its resilience and contribution to the dividends of its people not necessarily democracy. “So, I think it is time to have a rethink. Nothing shocks me more than to see Ifeanyi Okowa jump out of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) where he was vice presidential candidate.

Without an opposition how can we have a government? So that is the problem. “Everybody wants to be in government and it is not possible. People want to be in government with the mentality of the winner takes it all and nobody wants to be in the opposition and that is why we are not growing.

“One of my big points is that it is time to rethink, reflect and see that this Western model is not working and that is our problem. “Everybody will agree that this model is not working because in the last 25 years it hasn’t worked. So, can’t we begin to think about a new process. The beginning of a new process is to think through it but what I see is that everybody is happy.

“The big talk was 2023 and the next big talk is 2027 and no one cares to ask what exactly would we have in 2027. I want the conversation to start by asking the question, is this thing working for us? My answer is that the Western model of democracy, maybe it is working in New York but it is not working here. So, what is it that we can put on the take that will work?

“I think that the first thing to do is to recognize that this country is divided along ethnic, religious and linguistic lines. So, whatever we are going to do, we will take into account these divisions. That is not happening here. What we see is a very strong centrifugal power centre in Abuja, which excludes every other person.”