He explained that to solve Nigeria’s problem, discussion on restructuring alone will not help except the minds of every Nigerians is restructured.

Jonathan spoke on Thursday at the 18th Daily Trust Dialogue with the theme: ‘Restructuring in Nigeria: Why? How? When?’

“My conviction is that discussion on restructuring will not help except we restructure our minds because some of the challenging issues at the national level still exist at the state and local levels.

“For instance, in some states, it is not easy for some persons to win an election because of the area they come from. The language they speak or their religious belief.

“Take a look at how local government elections are conducted at the state level. Why is it very difficult for an opposition party to win a chairmanship or councillorship seat in a state, despite the fact that the same party probably secured seats in the state Assembly and National Assembly elections, organised by a federal election management body?

“This shows that restructuring alone may not solve all the anomalies in the system,” Jonathan said.

The former INEC boss stated this at the 18th Daily Trust Dialogue with the theme: ‘Restructuring in Nigeria: Why? How? When?’

“After a critical evaluation of the benefits versus the costs of each of these notions of restructuring, I believe that the starting point of desirable and serious, even realistic, restructuring is equitable redistribution of power and resources from the Federal Government to the sub-national governments,” Jega said.

The former INEC chairman, however, said that dismantling the current structure and going back to the pre-1966 regional structure, the 12 states of 1976/77 or making use of six geo-political regions are unrealistic, The Punch reports.

He stated, “The social and political costs of such an undertaking would by far outweigh the benefits. In many fundamental respects, creation of states has gone a long way to mitigate real and imagined/perceived marginalisation of minorities.”