LASU Professor Adewunmi Falode has urged Nigeria to replace its current two-term, four-year system with a single seven-year tenure for elected officials, arguing that it would stabilise governance and reduce political and financial waste.
Professor Adewunmi Falode of Lagos State University has called for a constitutional amendment to replace Nigeria’s two-term, four-year system with a single, non-renewable seven-year tenure, arguing that the current arrangement is “wasteful” and fuels instability. Delivering LASU’s 115th inaugural lecture, he said elected officials lose valuable time to litigation and early politicking, leaving only months for effective governance. Citing examples from Mexico and the Philippines, Falode insisted that a longer single term would provide stability while still accommodating campaign and petition periods.
He further advocated “competitive federalism,” stronger states, compulsory secondary education, and tailored national policies to address Nigeria’s long-standing governance, ethnic, and developmental challenges, stressing that the country must “customise or domesticate its federalism” rather than copy foreign models wholesale.