The Nigerian Senate last Thursday suspended Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan (Kogi Central) for six months for what it called her total violation of the Senate Standing Rules which allegedly brought the presiding officer and the entire Nigerian Senate to public opprobrium.

The suspension was announced by Senate President Godswill Akpabio following the approval of the recommendation of the Ethics and Privileges Committee to penalize Natasha for the said infraction. Public responses to the development have been varied. Whereas the majority of senators supported the suspension, some analysts believe the approach of the senate did not project its members as true democrats.

The senate relied heavily on the Legislative Houses (Powers and Privileges) Act of 2018 which among other things regulates the conduct of members and other persons connected with the proceedings of the Legislative House. Of particular importance is Section 21(2) of the Act which provides that ‘where any member is guilty of contempt of a Legislative House, the House, may by resolution, reprimand such member or suspend him from the service of the House for such period as it may determine.’Although this law may on its face valuelook harmless to the House, there is doubt if the attempt by our legislators to cover themselves with a cloak of tyranny can stand the test of time.  

A body such as the senate which does not have the power to make a senator, cannot give itself the power to unmake any senator. There are only two authorities that our constitution empowers to remove a legislator from office. These are: an election tribunal and the people that elected the legislator to represent them in the legislature. If an authority has no legal powers to remove a person from office, such an authority cannot validly exercise the illegal power by making the removal a short-term matter. Removal by one day in the name of suspension is a removal, it is irrelevant that the length of time of the removal is long or short; because as the saying goes, no person, group or authority can give what it does not have. 

The senate or any group or organization is no doubt entitled to making its own rules for the smooth running of the body. It is therefore in order for the senate to make rules to penalize its members for any infraction, but such punishment must be within its powers. If the senate is satisfied that Senator Natasha Uduaghan breached any of its rules, it can remove her from a chairmanship position of a committee or any other privileges hitherto bestowed on her by the senate. It can however not extend the punishment beyond its own power. This point has been repeatedly made and one wonders why our Legislative Houses have continued with the illegality of purporting to have the power to suspend one of its own.

If they really don’t know, the courts have since severally said so. First, Femi Okurounmu, (Ogun Central) was suspended in 1999. This was followed by Joseph Waku, a senator from Benue State who was suspended in 2000. Senator Arthur Nzeribe from Imo state was suspended in 2002. Senator Ali Ndume, a former Senate leader was suspended in 2017. Next was Senator Ovie Omo Agege form Delta state who was suspended in 2018. There was also the recent case of Senator Abdul Ningi from Bauchi state who was suspended in 2024. Interestingly, the Judiciary quashed all the suspensions declaring them as illegal and unconstitutional. The case of Senator Omo Agege probably stood out because of the initial insistence of the court that the other party – the senate must also be heard. At the end it was also quashed.

The House of Representatives has also had its own string of illegal suspensions that have similarly been quashed by the Judiciary. One would have thought that the National Assembly should have by now realized that it has no powers to suspend its legislators. But that has not been so. Instead, there have been reports of how some State Houses of Assembly have also followed the same line as their federal colleagues. Luckily for our democracy, it was one of the suspensions from one state that gave the judiciary the room to throw ample light on the subject of Legislative Housesand their powers to suspend their members. The celebrated case involved one Rifkatu Samson Dannaswho was suspended in 2012 by the Bauchi State House of Assembly.

The offence of Dannas, the then only female and Christian member of the House was her objection to the proposed relocation of Tafawa Balewa Local Government headquarters from Tafawa Balewa to Bununu- a location heavily populated by Muslims.  She was suspended without listening to the voice of reason that the headquarters of local governments listed in the constitution cannot be changed without constitutional amendment. She went to court to challenge her suspension which the court declared as illegal and unconstitutional.The House appealed but the Court of Appeal also ruled in Danna’s favour just as the Supreme Court declined to order a stay of execution of the Appeal Court judgment that reinstated Danna. Aptly put therefore, the state of the law in Nigeria today is that it is illegal for a legislative House to suspend any member.

Beyond the law, it is also a notorious fact that a legislator is not an employee of a Legislative Chamber. Leaders of the latter need to therefore appreciate that they cannot hire and fire their members. It is true that section 21(2) of the Legislative Houses (Powers and Privileges) Act of 2018 earlier referred to empowers anyLegislative House to penalize members who breach any rules of the House. It is equally true that the Act was signed into law in 2018 making it appear to be a valid law but any aspect of the law which is at variance with the constitution is without doubt illegal. Thus, Legislative Houses ought to listen to the persuasive argument that it is unfair to penalize a constituency in the guise of sanctioning an offending legislator.

Section 39(1) of the Nigerian constitution grants every person freedom of expression, including the freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information without interference. To underscore the importance of this freedom, Section 39(2) explicitly empowers citizens to “own, establish and operate any medium for the dissemination of information, ideas and opinions.” For as long as any such opinion is not defamatory, no one including a legislator can be deprived of his freedom of expression. Accordingly, the senate cannot penalize Uduaghan for expressing an opinion.At the same time, internal rules of the senate cannot take precedence over the nation’s constitution.

Again, the posture that the legislature cannot be stopped from doing its job appears misconstrued because legislative functions are in the words of our constitution subject to judicial review.  Perhaps it is important to restate the relevant provision of Section 4(8) of our constitution which states clearly that, “the exercise of legislative powers by the National Assembly or by a House of Assembly shall be subject to the jurisdiction of courts of law and of judicial tribunals established by law, and accordingly, the National Assembly or a House of Assembly shall not enact any law, that ousts or purports to oust the jurisdiction of a court of law or of a judicial tribunal established by law.”

For this reason, the courts have continued to insist that “access to court is a fundamental right in the Constitution, which cannot be taken away by force or intimidation from any organ.” We know Uduaghan is already in court and that the details of the case are still sketchy. But,whether or not the senate has correctly handled the subject would become clearer shortly. To start with, it is unimaginable as one lawyer suggested the other day that although Order 67(4) of its own rules limits the suspension of a member of the upper chamber to a maximum of 14 days, the senate went ahead to violate such rules by suspending Uduaghan not for 14 days but for 6 months. 

From the points we have made in this article, we insist that the senate has no powers to suspend any member adding that the suspension of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan representing Kogi Central, for even 30minutes has no legal backing.In addition, we urge our legislators to refrain from the tendency to now and again give themselves powers that are at variance with our constitution. The current National Assembly in particular should seek to set a record of an institution which does not function outside the rule of law by serving as democrats who never seek to act in excess of the powers given to them.

The political control of the resources of the territory known as Rivers state in Nigeria’s Niger Delta has been a site of curious jurisprudence since the acting consul of the Oil Rivers Protectorate, Harry Johnston, procured the judicial liquidation of King Jaja of Opobo in December 1887 in Accra, present capital of Ghana. The charge against King Jaja was the violation of a treaty obligation to assist the British “in the execution of such duties as may be assigned.” At the end of proceedings which lasted less than one day before a forum described by Elvar Ingimundarsson as a “Kangaroo court”, King Jaja was convicted and sentenced to exile. The court also prohibited the people of Opobo from designating a replacement for him.

At the end of February 2025, Nigeria’s supreme court continued a tradition of afflicting the people of the territory of Rivers with curious jurisprudence. Separated by 137 years, the decision of the supreme court in the latest of the legal disputes from the political rift between incumbent governor, Siminalayi Fubara, and his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, reprises essential parallels with the trial and exile of King Jaja with haunting similarity. 

Now, as then, the underlying dispute is really about “a treaty”, in this case, allegedly between the governor and his predecessor, the terms of which also appear to be about “the execution of such duties as may be assigned….” The court orders are against a ruling figure (Governor Fubara) from Opobo and the political effect is to seek to exile him from office while precluding any other Opobo person from replacing him. 

Context is necessary to understand the case that the supreme court had to decide. Going into the 2023 election, the governor of Rivers, Nyesom Wike, was term-limited. In 2020 and 2021, he publicly declared that he would not impose a successor on the state. In 2023, he did. His choice was a little-known public servant from Opobo-Nkoro, Sim Fubara. After the election, their relationship disintegrated. The reasons are subliminal in this case; the consequences are explicit.

In December 2023, 27 members of the Rivers state house of assembly loyal to Nyesom Wike, including the Speaker Martin Amaewhule, ostentatiously announced that they had defected to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). In 2015, the Supreme Court of Nigeria ruled that such defection is permissible only if the political party from which the legislators seek to defect is so hopelessly splintered that it “makes it impossible or impracticable for [the] political party to function as such”. If not, according to the court, “the defector automatically loses (sic) his seat”.

With the defection of Martin Amaewhule and his 26 other colleagues, the house of assembly of Rivers state became factionalised. The remaining five members were loyal to the incumbent governor. Shortly after the defection of the Amaewhule faction in December 2023, the premises of the Rivers state house of assembly were demolished,  ostensibly on the orders of the state government. The faction loyal to the state governor relocated to the Government House where, shortly thereafter, they purported to pass into law the 2024 Appropriation Bill for the State, which became law when the governor promptly assented to it.

The outbreak of litigation that followed has been inexhaustible. The appeal determined by a five-person panel of the supreme court on February 28, 2025, is one of them. Essentially, it sought orders to restrain the Central Bank of Nigeria from remitting to Rivers state its share of the proceeds from the Federation Account except to finance a budget passed by the Amaewhule faction of the state house of assembly. In other words, this was litigation asking the judiciary to take sides in what is in fact a very grubby dispute over control of Rivers state’s money. 

This case travelled up to the supreme court with supreme alacrity. The federal high court delivered judgment on October 30, 2024, a mere three and a half months after filing on July 15. Not wishing to be outdone, the court of appeal delivered judgment on December 13, 2024, less than a month and a half later. The supreme court has been equally supersonic in bringing the case to judgment.

The supreme court dealt with two issues when it should have addressed at least three. First, it affirmed the jurisdiction of the federal high court to hear the case. Next, on the question of whether the rump of the house of assembly of Rivers state loyal to the governor could constitutionally sit to pass the 2024 budget, it held that they could not. In support of this position, the court cited precedent applicable to when the legislature sits on impeachment, a special procedure for which the constitutionally prescribed parliamentary arithmetic is different. 

The third issue, it left unattended. The court simply proceeded without deliberation or reasoning to grant all the orders asked for.

An injunction, the principal relief sought in this case, is notoriously a remedy in equity, only granted deliberatively. Over one century ago, the path-breaking decision in The Lusitania laid down the principle that “as a general rule of both civil and common law…. the remedy must be commensurate with the injury received”.

There are four glaring problems with this supreme court judgment. The first is not what is in it but what is missing. Lawyers claim that “equity does not act in vain”. The supreme court did not bother to provide any reasoning or justification for its orders, leaving it open to legitimate accusations of having acted in vain or in a transaction. Granting the court every latitude on the violations that it found, its orders are an unreasoned overreach. 

Second, ordering the Central Bank to withhold Rivers state’s share of the federation account is, at best, a rogue order that punishes the people for a dispute between politicians. It violates the maxim that “equity regards the beneficiary (in this case the people of Rivers State) as the true owner”. Their right to their share of the federation account is antecedent to, independent of, and unconnected with the dispute in this case. 

Third, being aware of the ongoing litigation on the legal consequences of the defection of the Amaewhule faction of the state house of assembly, the supreme court short-circuited a contingent appellate process and issued dispositions on a dispute that was neither before it nor necessary for the determination of the issues it was called upon to decide. In doing so, the court chose, with a touch of injudicious shamelessness, to accept the invitation to take sides in the underlying political dispute in Rivers state. 

Fourth, the supreme court announced revolutionary jurisprudence on the judicial fly, claiming that, in cases where there is a disputed defection, “[o]nly the [legislature] can declare a seat vacant for defection and not the Governor of a State. Not even the Courts can do so.” It takes heedless audacity for an apex court to castrate the judiciary. That is exactly what the court did with this line in italics. When the supreme court laid down the contrary principle in 2015, it was by a panel of seven justices. This supreme court purports to overrule that principle without even citing, acknowledging, or considering its earlier decisions on the same point. Moreover, a five-person panel of the supreme court cannot overrule a seven-person panel.

When Chief Justice of Nigeria, Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, showed up reportedly to turn the sod on proposed judicial digs with Nyesom Wike last October, there were unheeded warnings then concerning the prohibitive institutional costs of such dalliance with a notorious political litigant who has a reputation for instrumentalising the courts. Many will look at this recent decision from the supreme court and say, “we told you so”. For the CJN, it will be argued that she was not on the panel, to which the response will be that she chose the judges and constituted the panel.

On December 1, 1887, the Kangaroo court of Rear Admiral Walter Hunt-Grubbe ruled that the presence of King Jaja in Opobo “would be fatal” to British commercial interests and authorised his eventual exile to the West Indies. The judgment was widely seen as a transactional travesty, and its effect, it was said, was “to haunt the British colonial administration in West Africa for a long time”. It may similarly be said of what the courts of post-colonial Nigeria did in the 137th year of that iniquity that they sought in another transactional travesty to exile another figure from Opobo from his position because his presence would be fatal to the interests of Nigeria’s most prolific political litigant.  

A lawyer and a teacher, Odinkalu can be reached at chidi.odinkalu@tufts.edu 

Former Deputy National Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Olabode George, in this interview by BOLA BADMUS speaks on the leadership crisis rocking the Lagos State House of Assembly and the reinstatement of sacked Mudashiru Ajayi Obasa as its Speaker following the resignation of Mojisola Meranda from the position.

You recently described the reinstatement of Mudashiru Obasa as the Speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly as “an embarrassment.” But some other people will argue that it is democracy in action because he was re-elected by his colleagues.

Did they re-elect him? Did they sit to say okay, they wanted a new speaker? Did they remove Meranda as the incumbent Speaker? There are procedures to these things.

But Meranda resigned as the Speaker and therefore paved the way for Obasa to return to his former position.

And so they now returned him? If they are deceiving themselves, they cannot deceive the general public. If you are the leader of a party and the party was going to go through a procedure, and they accused the Speaker of a lot of inappropriate activities – financial and otherwise – shouldn’t you even address those issues? Since he didn’t do it, there is no need for Obasa to respond to the allegations levelled against him. The same people came back and reinstated or re-elected him. It is an indecent approach to what democracy is all about.

If you were accused of certain misdemeanor openly and people went through a process by which they said enough of you, if you want to come back, you know you will have to defend yourself first. It’s already in the public domain but there was an order that he should be reinstated since it is a private enterprise. Do you return people like that in a democratic dispensation to override whatever others had been saying? Is it that those Assembly members didn’t know what they had been talking about before they removed Obasa, or they are absolutely acting like a military organisation? When I look at it on the political side, our party (PDP) has a system; our party has procedures. Sometimes, you can have these procedures to reassure the public that we are better managers when we are challenged.

You can see who is in charge. It’s a private enterprise, he can hire and fire. Is that democracy? You can’t have your opinion to explain yourself based on the demands from your constituency. I have said several times that APC is not a proper political party but a congregation of strange bedfellows. It was a Lagos State House of Assembly matter, do they have a caucus? Does the executive of the party in Lagos have a caucus? When I say caucus, it’s the unifying group, like the equivalent of the Board of Trustees at the national level, do they have that? The caucus would meet, the Speaker himself would be a member, the deputy Speaker would be a member of the same caucus, the state chairman and the state secretary would be members, and then some elders from some other local governments would be members of that caucus representing those local governments, like they claimed they have a GAC, what is the effect of the GAC? So what are their own approaches to resolving the problem? Nothing. Nothing, they got divided.

There was this committee comprising former Governors Bisi Akande and Segun Osoba that met over the matter.

You mean the committee that went to Tinubu in Abuja? Are they from Lagos State? You now raised the matter beyond the state… If you look at this party called APC, apart from Ganduje parading himself as chairman, who is the National Secretary of APC? Who is the National Organising Secretary of the APC? Where is their Exco? The only thing we heard recently was that they held a general assembly, is that the way to run a political party? So I am looking at it from the angle that because all these shenanigans must be explained to the electorate, the electorate holds the power to elect or sack you at the election time based on your performances and based on their perception of your management style. And you can see it is an emperor that owns that party. All those boys by their various constituencies, how did they get elected? Did the decisions to elect them come from their constituencies or it was just from one desk? Godfatherism is their major definition of a political party. If the big boss doesn’t say you are free to go, you can’t go. So the decision is not with the constituency and the people. The real owners of governance are the people; that is the essence of democracy. They elect who they want and when you don’t perform, by next election they throw you out.

But you see the mess we call INEC? I am now trying to explain the fallout, the lackluster approaches to solve political problems in this country. There is no way we can talk about it without referring to the procedure by which we elect State Assembly lawmakers, senators, House of Representatives members, governors and the president. It is shambolic, it’s a complete disgrace, it should be completely overhauled if we want peace and development in this country. we have to completely overhaul this INEC, the personalities there, because they bought the system, they bought the equipment, the computers so that all these interlopers who write things by hand and manipulate the process can be completely flushed out. Once you vote, the results go to the BVAS and then the results would come out.

The last time they told us it was glitch that caused the problem. So it is not just what is being displayed at the Lagos State House of Assembly, no. It is deeper than that. It has now opened our eyes to the lackluster approach to managing this country. It is not working, and if we continue with that mess without getting to clean out the INEC and the procedure, we are just joking. It would get worse.

It is an eye opener and I am appealing to President Tunubu being from the South West to go back into history to remember all these. Did he not remember the crisis in Ibadan? Did he remember the Ajasin and Omoboriowo crisis? The Abiola issue also came too.

If you were Moji Meranda, what would you have done in the face of her party’s directive that she should resign her position?

What could she do? How did she get the ticket in the first instance? That’s what I am saying. You would say she had a primary election to compete with other aspirants in her constituency, but how did she emerge? Does she have the nerve or gut to talk? The godfather gave her the ticket. Who were her competitors as aspirant? So a house built on nothing would remain on nothing, there is no foundation. I am talking because I had gone through the mill, managing our party, PDP, we have a procedure. Although we are also trying to ensure that that procedure is not manipulated by people. What we are going through now is the shady way of trying to undermine the procedure established by the founding fathers of our party and some of us are saying never. No, PDP is not the private enterprise of anybody. If you want to be a member of PDP, you have to follow the rules. There are rules, we have a constitution, follow them.

The lady (Meranda), in some other countries, the constituency would have told her get out of the way, that’s not what we sent you to do. How did she get it, how many times has she gone back to her constituency meeting to ask for their needs? So if you were handpicked, like you are working for a company, the executive chairman of the company has the right to hire or fire. So you either keep your mouth shut or you are fired.

A group of Lagosians led by General Tajudeen Olanrewaju has been very vocal lately on this crisis. Do you think the group was right in reducing the tussle to an indigene versus settler matter?

It’s a mixture of all of these. They are approaching it not as politicians, I am approaching it as a politician. I am giving you my analysis of the tactical thing as a politician. But as a Lagosian, that is a different ball game. Traditionally, Lagos is the only state in Nigeria where we do not discriminate against people. We don’t discriminate. We accept people because it’s a trading port, the commercial nerve center of Nigeria and West Africa.

So whatever you want to sell, Lagos is there for you, so on that basis, people are now trying to use that and they have the boldness to say Lagos belongs to nobody. You know, you can’t go to Ogun State, first, they would ask you, are you Yewa? Are you Egba? Are you Remo? Are you Ijebu? See how close Ogun State is to Lagos. If you are not part of them, there is no way you can get anything. If you go to Oyo, they would ask you, are you Ibadan, are you Ogbomoso, are you from Oke-Ogun? If you are not, what are you looking for? The same thing happens if you go to Osun. Go to anywhere in any state, but Lagos is an example of the way we should live our lives because we accommodate people. Accommodating people doesn’t mean that there are no indigenous Lagosians.

When it comes to political matters, they are not running it and that is why it is so potently clear who these characters are. They are people who have no face for Lagos. The question would have been instantaneously asked before you even get any ticket in Ogun State. If you are not from any of the divisions, what are you looking for? So for me, there are no normal primaries being done here (Lagos) devoid of godfatherism. He selects the people he wants, whether you are indigene or non-indigene, as long as you kiss his wing, you are a good boy or you are a good woman. That’s not democracy and that is a house built on a faulty foundation and it would not last. There would be cracks because some day you would go and when you go, what happens?

As for the Renaissance, they are looking at the crisis in the Lagos State House of Assembly from the cultural point of view. Where are our people? If you look at the people that were handpicked, and sent down there, I don’t know how many of them are real indigenous Lagosians. The young lady that was put there as speaker before she was asked to resign from the position is an indigene. Is it the indigenes versus non-indigenes playing out in the Obasa issue? It is a political issue. The management of their political system is what is faulty.

With what is happening now, do you think a truly indigenous Lagosian will ever be governor again with the way you the indigenes are antagonising those controlling political power in the state?

You know political power is transient, even life itself is transient. Yes, they need to wake the indigenes up. If you sit down in your house and you are not participating in the process, and you have more of the non- indigenes than you, what do you do? You have to wake your people up, go and campaign and make sure the cultural thing is married to the politics. If you don’t do that you are just going to be howling there.

General Tajudeen Olanrewaju is my friend. We were born in the same area, and we grew up together. But I am in the heart of political activities, the Renaissance is the cultural part and I said the best is to match us together so that the procedures emerging from the political positions or the other, we would put all together and get our people to come out.

What is going on now is a lesson for our indigenous people to wake up, wake up and join a political party. If you don’t join a political party, how do you emerge as governor? Would they come and beg you in your house? If you don’t emerge and be part of it, nobody would come and beg you. They are there, let them come out. Don’t say that politics is dirty, yes, it is dirty, also join and clean it out. You know, it takes a lot of guts to be able to achieve that. Like I said, they don’t do any serious competitive primaries, the godfather handpicks those to go for one position or the other.

What advice do you have for Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Speaker Obasa and President Bola Tinubu on the way Lagos is being run?

You know I am on the competitive side, my advice is just to say: Take it easy. If I wanted to be selfish, I would have said, what is my business? I would say it is in the interest of my own political party for them to collapse. But I am a Lagosian. One Yoruba adage says if heaven is going to fall, it doesn’t discriminate at all, but would fall on everyone.

Some people thought they were not concerned about the crisis in the Lagos Assembly. All the crises we have witnessed in this country, some people said they were not concerned, but when the whole thing collapsed, people died, people from across the country. It affected everyone. Let us, for the sake of the younger generation and the future generations of this country, do what is right, let us do what is just, let us do what is equitable because goodness and godliness go together and that is the only investment that does not fail. ‘Wuwuru’ or ‘warawara,’ ‘wayo,’ ‘jibiti’ also have its reward.

Let them take a cue from the performance of Papa Obafemi Awolowo: First in the field of education. Many of those you see today would not have been able to have that exposure if not for Chief Awolowo. He knew that education makes people easy to govern but difficult to deceive. Once you educate people properly, they know their duties as citizens, duties as a child to parents, duties to the state.

What has happened in the Lagos State House of Assembly is just an example of the madness, an offshoot of what God is making us to see and I pray that the electorate would also open their eyes and see the futility and the lackluster management style, and that ‘Baba says’ is not in democracy.

[Nigerian Tribune]

With Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan (PDP, Kogi central) suspended by the senate for “misconduct” and “refusal to comply with the seating arrangement” in the red chamber, may we now carefully proceed to the substance of her allegation against Senate President Godswill Akpabio? We need not be distracted from the serious allegation against the nation’s No 3 citizen. From what I have seen so far, it is quite obvious that the Nigerian society does not yet take sexual harassment allegations seriously. We still appear to be living in an age when those who allege sexual harassment are subjected to ridicule and reproach. I propose that we have a rethink over this cynical attitude. 

But contrary to what you might have been reading, Akpoti-Uduaghan was not suspended for making a sexual harassment allegation against Akpabio. That is why it is dangerous to take your cue from social media. Someone even commented: “How can Akpabio preside over his own case?” Such profound ignorance could be misleading and contagious — this was obvious in the subsequent comments and positions canvassed by prominent opinion leaders. No, Akpoti-Uduaghan was not suspended for making the allegation. She was suspended for her conduct at the senate plenary on February 20, 2025 when she relentlessly tongue-lashed Akpabio over the new seating arrangement.

When I watched the video, I knew she was going to be suspended. Anywhere in the world (and I stand to be challenged on this), as soon as the person with the gavel bangs it to call you to order, you just have to shut up, otherwise there will be consequences. It is a parliamentary practice dating back to centuries. In a court of law, as soon as the judge calls you to order with the gavel, you have to obey. I did not need any special skills to predict that Akpoti-Uduaghan would be suspended. Nonetheless, there is something about the national assembly leadership that views dissent as mutiny. The lawmakers behave like a close-knit confraternity: a dissenter is sent out — into the cold.

There is a publicly known sequence of events culminating in Akpoti-Uduaghan’s suspension. On February 20, she — on full volume — told off the senate president for moving her seat. Senator Mohammed Monguno, the chief whip, said it was to accommodate senators who recently defected from the PDP to the ruling APC. He read out the relevant rules. Akpoti-Uduaghan sprang to her feet to talk, but Akpabio refused to recognise her. He ordered that she be ejected from the chamber as she kept talking. Her microphone was muted but she continued to talk. The infraction was not that she objected (people often object) but because she refused to be moved and kept berating Akpabio.

Days after the heated confrontation with Akpabio, Akpoti-Uduaghan said her seat was changed to silence her. “Changing my seat was just a chance of silencing or alienating me from being seen. Sitting position is important. The nearer you sit… positions you near the camera and gives you an added advantage to be called upon to contribute to debates,” she told a radio station based in Abuja. “Ordinarily, I’m already sitting at the very back. But then, I was now moved suddenly without any notice. Without any information, my seat was moved to the far corner, a part where the cameras don’t capture.” This sequence of events was what was televised and known to the general public.

However, on February 28, Akpoti-Uduaghan dropped the nuclear bomb on ARISE TV. “Mine is the case of a student being punished by a lecturer for refusing to sleep with him,” she said, before going into details. “It all started on 8th December, 2023, which was a day before his birthday and mine — we are birthday mates. We all moved to his house in Uyo at about 8pm. He held my hands and he said he wanted to show me round his house. My husband was walking behind us, just the three of us. We were walking around from room to room. He showed me the beautiful interior. I noticed that he hastened his pace while still holding my hand and my husband was behind on his phone.”

She alleged that it was at this point that Akpabio made the indecent proposal. “He got to this particular sitting room and he said ‘do you like my house’. I said, of course sir. He said ‘now that you are a senator, I’m going to create time for us to come and spend quality moment here. You will enjoy it’. At that point, I just pulled away… that I don’t understand what he meant.” Akpoti-Uduaghan also alleged that when she met Akpabio at his office to ask why he was repeatedly stepping down her motions, the senate president told her she could enjoy a whole lot if “I just take care of him”. Now, these are grievous allegations that should not be conflated or confused with seating arrangement.

Akpoti-Uduaghan’s suspension and the withdrawal of the incredibly sumptuous privileges top Nigerian government officials enjoy would not be the first in our history, so I am ready to live with that. Many senators and reps have been suspended in the past and more will be suspended in the future. Even if she is suspended forever (as long as it is legal), I am ready to stomach it. From all indications, they were chummy, so something went wrong and I suspect half the story has not been told yet. “Her husband is our friend,” senate leaders keep saying, even letting out a state secret that he was asked to nominate someone for a position — a privilege usually reserved for the gods.

What I cannot accept — and, I would suggest, Nigerians should vehemently reject — is the trivialisation of sexual harassment allegations. People are lining up to defend Akpabio one after the other. His wife took the extraordinary step of filing a defamation suit against Akpoti-Uduaghan. Have you noticed that not a single senator, male or female, has spoken in favour of Akpoti-Uduaghan? Is it because no one wants to lose out of the senate “ogbono” soup in this Tinubu economy? Or are there other reasons we need to know? Many social media warriors are tearing Akpoti-Uduaghan to pieces (and some are well paid for the hatchet job) but her supporters are putting up a great fight as well.

My real concern is the allegation of sexual harassment. This must be fully probed. Her petition was first dismissed out of hand over procedural lapses. She has re-presented it. The senate must be seen to do a diligent job of investigating the allegation. It is a sacred duty they owe not only to themselves but also to Nigerians. I know many things are wrong with our country (for which Nigeria has been written off as “finished” by many people). Still, we should not accept that this is the best we can be. No, Nigeria can be far better than this and it is matters of this nature that can benchmark our place in the comity of civilised nations. No attempt should be made to sweep these grave allegations away.

By the way, I am not suggesting that Akpabio sexually harassed her. I cannot in all conscience conclude that the allegation is true or false. It could even be a misunderstanding on both sides — perhaps how Akpoti-Uduaghan felt is different from what Akpabio meant, and vice-versa. I don’t know. I can’t say. I am ready to give both parties the benefit of the doubt. That is why the allegation should be thoroughly investigated. We must resist any attempt to sweep it under the carpet. We must reject any attempt to dismiss it based on technicalities. We must ignore every attempt to downplay the saga by referring to the past conducts of both senators. Every case is unique.

Whatever the outcome of the investigation may be, certain things need to be established going forward. Nations use events like this to reform their systems. For one, the national assembly must come up with a robust sexual harassment policy. The world is changing (whether we like it or not). There are certain expressions that we have to avoid or withdraw if considered inappropriate. In fact, the policy must be universally applicable across Nigerian institutions and offices. Nigeria is not an island. You may get away with an inappropriate comment in Abuja but get punished in Aberdeen. By the way, I do not suggest that Akpabio is guilty but it is quite important to put down the marker.

Without prejudice to the outcome of the investigation of this saga, we may need to update provisions on sexual harassment in the code of conduct for public officials. This should include punishments for making false claims: we should not take it for granted that everyone who alleges harassment is telling the truth. There should be safeguards so that justice is not miscarried. Our laws must also institute independent mechanism for probing and punishing sexual harassment and abuse of office. The senators have not behaved in a way that will make the public trust them to do justice to this allegation. I have only seen key senators take turns to divert attention from the issue at hand.

Outside the sexual harassment allegation, I think the senate (and the house of reps) should improve its broadcast system. Akpoti-Uduaghan complained that those sitting at the back are at a disadvantage when it comes to being recognised to talk. This sounds trivial, but it is still a point to note. The cameras should be positioned in a way that every senator can be well captured. No senator should be gravely disadvantaged. This looks tiny, but it can address a problem. It may even make some senators stay awake during plenary. However, Akpoti-Uduaghan’s complaint that some of her motions are stepped down or not listed is neither here nor there — every senator experiences that.

Finally (trust me to not let this go without a comment), do you notice that in this crisis, the senators are of one accord? No Hausa, no Fulani, no Yoruba, no Igbo, no southerner, no northerner, no Christian, no Muslim, no male, no female, no APC, no PDP, no Labour Party. The same thing happened when they all got the latest SUVs in 2023. This has reinforced my belief, or theory, that Nigeria is fundamentally divided into two: the elite and the rest of us. It is lowly Nigerians that abuse and kill each other over religion and region. The elite play sectional sentiments only when their interests are threatened. Otherwise, they are a fraternity. May we understand this truth someday.

AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…

BY FIRE, BY FORCE

On Thursday, men of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) invaded the headquarters of the Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company (IKEDC), vandalised its offices and brutalised its officials. Why? The NAF base in Ikeja was reportedly owing N4 billion and Ikeja Electric disconnected their power supply. Ikeja Electric has a lot of bills to pay — for every N1 revenue it collects, it has to pay power generation companies (who also have to pay their gas suppliers), the transmission company (TCN) and the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC). I used to think air force is the “gentlest” of the armed forces. And for those praying for military rule, I hope they enjoyed the taster. Impunity.

CRAZY DEMONSTRATION

The comedy show at the Lagos house of assembly peaked on Monday with the resignation of Mojisola Meranda as the speaker and the reinstatement of Mudashiru Obasa, who had previously been removed by 32 out of the 40 members. Our version of democracy which Fela called “demonstration of craze” and “crazy demonstration” was fully televised. Even though all the actors and their godfathers and guardians were cut from the same cloth and none of them can claim a higher moral ground, I think they went too far with the comedy show. We are not even pretending to have any respect for democratic tenets again. We are dancing naked in the market place. Disgusting.

RIP, OKUPE

Dr Doyin Okupe, spokesman of the National Republican Convention (NRC) in the annulled third republic and former spokesman to Presidential Olusegun Obasanjo, died on Friday a few weeks to his 73rd birthday. He had survived a number of critical health challenges in recent years, even to the point of death. The last time we met, I think in 2022, he said he was working on his memoir. He had a title already. I tried to sign him on to CableBooks, our publishing arm, and we agreed to take the discussion further but, regrettably, we didn’t. He has now died without telling us his story, which I believe would be very rich and revealing. I pray that his family would be comforted. Amen.

NO COMMENT

How are the mighty fallen! The PDP will not be fielding a candidate in the Anambra governorship election holding on November 8. In my record, this is the first time the party would not be fielding a governorship candidate in any state since 1999. Alhaji Abdullahi Ganduje, the APC national chairman, poked fun at his former party on Friday, but I would say the joke is on our democracy. The PDP, as the ruling party, expanded mostly by using state power to woo or cajole opposition figures. The APC is doing the same. Competitive democracy suffers body blows when there is limited opposition. Come, was it not the same PDP that once threatened to rule Nigeria for 60 years non-stop? Wonderful.

Recent stories in some national and foreign media outlets as well as informal surveys indicate that the prices of some staple food items have been falling across Nigeria. This is noteworthy for three reasons. One, the decline in prices is not all due to seasonality: prices are not falling just because all the affected food items are in season or because there is a glut in supply from ongoing harvest. Two, the Ramadan period usually coincides with high food prices because of surge in demand as most consumers would normally stock up on food for, and in anticipation of, the fasting period. So, a noticeable fall in prices of food items at this period bucks a known trend. And three, a persistent rise in food prices poses a constant risk not just to individuals struggling to feed themselves but also to the stability of the country. Nigerians and Nigeria need this price break.

This is thus a major and welcome relief. And the President Bola Tinubu administration should take the glory, as long as the administration will not try to shift the blame if and when food prices start rising again. I have written many times in the last 20 months or so about the danger of high food prices in a country where food alone accounts for about 60% of household expenditures. With food inflation around 40% (before the CPI rebasing), my greatest fear was a food protest that could spiral in many ugly directions. We narrowly escaped one of such last August. It is therefore important to acknowledge this tasteful moment, give kudos where it is due, and pray and hope that food prices (and cost of living in general) will continue to track down. But we need to go beyond prayer and optimism. We need to fully understand the drivers of this positive trend, and ensure that we pay more serious, systematic and sustainable attention not just to food prices but also to the larger issue of food security. We shall return to this shortly.

A number of media outlets have documented the notable fall in food prices in the last few weeks. I have seen stories and surveys in Daily Trust, BusinessDay, Nairametrics, ThisDay, The Guardian, TVC, Channels and Aljazeera, among others. I have also spoken to a few people in the food business. Prices of most raw food items that in and out season are falling while those of processed and packaged food items and fruits are not falling yet or, in some cases, are still rising. The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) publishes two important reports that should help with concrete data: the Cost of a Healthy Diet (COHD) report and Selected Food Prices Watch. These reports, especially the latter, should have current prices of major food items, and should show shifts in prices on monthly and yearly basis. We look forward to the most current issues of these reports.

Ahead of the release of these reports, we can safely work with the surveys by media houses. Aljazeera reported that the prices of some grains crashed by as much as 40% in the past few weeks. On 26^th February, BusinessDay highlighted noticeable fall in the prices of beans, yam, rice, tomatoes and garri, ranging from a decline of 23% for imported rice to 70% for tomatoes. In its monthly price survey, Nairametrics stated that the price of a 50kg bag of garri fell by 10%, a medium-sized tuber of yam by 15%, a basket of pepper by 29% and a bag of dry onions by 43%. The Guardian, on its part, reported the decline in prices as follows: 39% for a bag of beans, 40% for a heap of 120 yams, 42% for a bag of millet, 66% for a bag of maize and 71% for a bag of sorghum. While prices of certain items like eggs, fruits, beverages and packaged/processed food items are yet to come down probably due to lag effect, the decline in the prices of major raw food items is significant and should be duly recognised. This is more so when it also bucks the global trend. According to the FAO Food Price Index, the prices of globally-traded food commodities in February 2025 increased by 1.6% month-on-month and by 8.2% year-on-year.

The logical question to ask is why the significant and atypical drop in food prices in Nigeria. To President Tinubu and his agriculture ministers (Senator Abubakar Kyari and Senator Aliyu Abdullahi), the answer is straightforward: the administration’s policies and interventions in the sector are working. Another official explanation is that the improvement in security in some parts of the north has translated to increase in food production, which then is leading to supply surpassing demand. It is possible that both are valid and reinforcing explanations. But it will be good to anchor such discussions on data. Policy should not be speaking and working without relevant data. For example, how many more hectares of land have been brought into cultivation due to improved security? And if we are seeing the fruits of Tinubu policies/gains, what particular policies are we talking about and how and by how much have they impacted the total outputs of the different food items? Without data and proper tracking, it will be difficult for government to know which policy is working, what it should do more or less of and how it can sustain the gains.

There have been some other explanations, ranging from the lifting of the ban on importation of food across land borders, the pausing of payment of duties and taxes on some imported food items (that is if that well-lauded presidential promise was allowed to eventually happen), the firming up of the Naira, and reported pausing of bulk purchase of grains that UN and US agencies distribute to IDP camps etc. The combined effect of these factors would be a fall in demand and rise in supply, leading inexorably to fall in prices in line with basic economics. Signalling could also be at play here. The continuous fall in prices could have prompted/nudged the farmers and traders storing up grains and other produces in their warehouses and barns for future higher prices to start offloading their stocks in order to cut their losses in case prices plunge further. This could contribute to increasing supply, further forcing prices down.  

In the absence of actual evidence, we can file all these under speculations for now. However, if one of the factors that have made the difference is the lifting of the ban on food importation/eventual implementation of the waiver of duties on rice, maize and other items, then it is gratifying that common sense finally prevailed. A good case must be made for protecting farmers. But the way to protect farmers is not by punishing the rest of the population with high food prices. If you protect farmers with unbearably high, and consistently soaring, food prices (when it is clear that we are not producing enough to meet demand), you are clearly and gratuitously inflicting pains on the many to protect the few.

Farmers are better protected when they can produce more from the same parcel of land and with the same or less effort or even subsidies on inputs and support services. Most citizens, including farmers, suffer from high food prices because even farmers cannot realistically produce all the food they consume. So, high food prices will catch up with them too. It is bad policy to continue to prioritise the welfare of the producers (farmers) over and above the welfare of the consumers.  We need to balance the two, and we need to constantly keep a trained eye on the risk to national stability. A country with consistently high food prices is just an acre away from trouble.

We need to properly understand the drivers of the current fall in food prices to ensure that it can be sustained. But we equally need to acknowledge that we have a lingering food security challenge. Nigeria steadily ranks low on global measures of food security. Our country was ranked 110 out of 127 countries on the Global Hunger Index for 2024 and 107 out of 113 countries on the Global Food Security Index for 2022. In November 2024, three UN agencies (UNICEF, FAO, WFP) claimed that as many as 33 million Nigerians could be food insecure this year. Also, the Cadre Harmonise projected that 33.2 million Nigerians may experience critical food and nutrition insecurity during the lean months of 2025. This is a 25.3% increase on the figure for the corresponding period of last year.

Despite accounting for 25% of our aggregate GDP and employing more than 30% of our labour force, Nigeria’s agricultural sector is not in fine fettle. It is a sector characterised by low productivity (a measly 1.19% GDP growth in 2024), low yields (our farmers produce less from the same size of land than their counterparts even in the subregion), and lingering supply gaps (we don’t produce enough to meet internal demand for even for food items like yam that we are the world’s leading producer). The sector continues to be hobbled by inadequate support system (extension services, credit, mechanisation, high-yield and pest-resistant seeds) and limited infrastructure (rural roads, irrigation, storage and processing facilities etc), all of which are further compounded by banditry and other forms of insecurity. The sum of all these is that even when agriculture remains our largest employer of labour, it is not pulling its weight. The farmers are operating at mostly subsistence level, struggling to eke out respectable living. Nigeria remains food insecure and the needed structural transformation is yet to happen. You can draw a direct line between the state of our agriculture and the state of economic development of our country.  

While it is important to note and celebrate the unusual fall in food prices now, we should ensure that it is a trend that can continue. But we should not lose sight of the bigger picture. We need to make the agricultural sector more productive, position Nigeria to be more food secure, free up more hands for manufacturing and services sectors, and put Nigeria on a firm development pathway. We need to see fixing our agriculture as a necessary step to fixing Nigeria. We need to upgrade food security to the status of national security. Section 16 A of the 1999 Constitution (one of the amendments of 2023) mandates “the State to promote and sustain activities that enhance food security”. Section 16(2)(d) already affirms a “right to food and food security.” We have to take food security as seriously as other countries that have made progress have. We don’t have to wait for a major upheaval to start prioritising this.

FOR most of last week, Senate President Godswill Akpabio was in the eye of the storm as his traducer, Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, who represents Kogi Central, was relentless in getting her voice hear loud and clear. Though the matter eventually culminated in the suspension of the Kogi senator for six months on Thursday, it is clear that the drama has not ended yet. The whole saga, as we have seen in the last few weeks, smacks of many wrongs and few rights. The Senate scored some rights and some wrongs, the same for Kogi senator. But in apportioning the rights and the wrongs, we have to distinguish between emotions and the rules.

Recall that in July of 2024, Senator Akpabio had compared the conduct of Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan to that of someone in a nightclub.  That statement incensed the Kogi Central Senator, the womenfolk and a number of senators. Days later, Akpabio, having sensed the mood of the Senate, spoke from his chair and said: “I will not intentionally denigrate any woman and always pray the God will uplift women, Distinguished Senator Natasha, I want to apologise to you.” That was expected of him and by that statement, Akpabio  brought some calm into the relationship between him and the Kogi senator, but as we are to discover in the last two weeks, still waters do run fast under the surface.

The latest scene of the drama started with what looked like an innocuous development on the Senate floor.  The Senate president, in exercise of the power conferred on him by the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and the Senate Rule book, made adjustments to the seats in the minority wing of the chamber and relocated Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan.  The excuse was that following the defection of some senators from the minority side, seat adjustments had to be effected. That was within Akpabio’s power. Remember that the Senate Rule book does not only empower the Senate president to allocate seats, he can also change the seats occasionally. So, Akpabio was right with that action. But perhaps, Akpoti-Uduaghan, based on family relationships with the Akpabios, expected that she would have been alerted of the impending seat change. And on getting to the floor of the Senate to discover the seat switch, she got alarmed. Was she right to flare up? No is the answer. Apart from the powers of the Senate president to change seats allocated to senators, the rule book also says that every senator must speak from the seat allocated. The implication is that anything a senator says outside the allocated seat will not go into the Senate records.  The Senate, or any parliament for that matter, is a regulated environment. The Hansards take records of every word and action made on the floor of the chamber. And so, it is incumbent on every senator to follow the rules.

So, on Thursday February 20, when Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan raised hell over her seat relocation, and engaged Senator Akpabio in a shouting match, she was on the wrong side of the Senate rule book. No Senator is expected to be unruly. In fact, unruly conducts can be summarily punished by the presiding officer. It is important to note that the rules of the Senate treat the occupier of the chair of Senate President like a golden egg. The President of the Senate is the number three citizen in the country, even though he was elected to represent a constituency like his colleagues. He is first among equals, but the numero uno position comes with a lot of difference.

A legislative expert once told me that the Chair of the President of the Senate must be revered at all times and that infractions to the rules are heavily punished unless the offender shows penitence. The rule says the President of the Senate must be heard in silence; Senators must avoid naming (being called out for unruly conduct); and that any situation that compels the President of the Senate to rise up  to hit the gavel in trying to restore order could earn the culprit (any named senator) summary dismissal. Those are the powers of the President of the Senate, which Madam Natasha was trying for size. I think it is important that Senators are taken through inductions on the rules and regulations whether they got in mid-term or at the beginning of the session. 

Rules are very key to operations in a big club like the Senate or the House of Representatives. But as we will later discover on this page, the number of years spent on the floor does not necessarily guarantee clear understanding of the rules.

Rather than go to the court of public opinion to accuse Akpabio of sexual harassment, Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan should have quietly assumed the seat allocated to her, raise her complaints through Order 10 and at the same time tender details of her allegation of sexual harassment against Akpabio and seek Senate’s intervention. If she had done that, she would have been on the right side of Senate rules and had Akpabio by the balls.  As much as the Senate rules forbid a senator from submitting a petition he or she personally signed, the Senate does not forbid any lawmaker from raising any allegations that affects either their rights of privileges on the floor. Several newspaper editors have been summoned before the Ethics Committee to answer questions of alleged breach of the privilege of senators.  I recall that as correspondents in the chamber, senators were always unhappy each time we scooped a story or blow open a report they were about to submit. Such senators didn’t need to write petition, they would only come to the floor and raise points of order on privilege. Senator Akpoti- Uduaghan failed to do that.

But the conduct of the Senate President and some of the principal officers on Wednesday March 5 left so much to be desired of the Senate. I was shocked to see Senator Akpabio rule Senator Natasha in order; he also ruled Senator Mohammed Monguno in order as well as Senator Opeyemi Bamidele. How do you have three right rulings on one issue? First, he allowed Senator Natasha to lay a defective petition on the Senate table. That’s expressly out of order. In the days of Senate Presidents David Mark, Bukola Saraki and Ahmad Lawan, we saw how such scenes were handled. A David Mark would simply ask the senator, ‘Distinguished Senator please open to Order 40(4) and read’. By the time the senator finished reading the order and seeing the order had negatived his or her motion, he would only be begging to withdraw that motion. That was not the case with Akpabio. And to make matters worse, the Clerks at the Table were also looking lost. They could not guide the presiding officer in any way. That tells a bit about human resource capacity in the assembly. But then the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele and the Chief Whip, Mohammed Monguno who have spent quite a long time in the National Assembly should know better. Their interventions did more damage to Akpabio’s Senate. When the Senate President had ruled Senator Natasha in order to submit a petition she personally signed, (against the rules of the Senate which forbids such),  and the Kogi Central Senator had approached the chair and laid the petition on the table, the matter in a way becomes sub judice, to borrow the language of the law.  The Senate Rule Book classifies that action as Matters Not open to Debate.” So at that point, the matter was no longer open to debate. Since the gavel has been hit and the action has been taken, no senator has the right to reopen the case. It was wrong of Senator Bamidele and Monguno to immediately start to revisit a closed matter and that’s illegal.

I recall an incident in the 6th Senate when President Umaru Yar’Adua was bedridden in Saudi Arabia. Some senators moved a motion, seeking the Senate constitute a panel to visit Saudi and ascertain the health status of the president. Somehow, when the motion was finally passed on a day Senator Ike Ekweremadu presided, it turned out that the motion only mandated the Federal Executive Council to do the assignment. The original proponents of the motion were enraged but they were not allowed to reopen the matter. They had to go into lobbying and eventually secured signatures of two-thirds of the Senate to re-table the matter and pave the way for the adoption of the famous “Doctrine of Necessity.” That’s how serious the matter should be, but it was trivialized by Akpabio, the Senate Leader and Senate Whip. That’s on the wrong side of the rule.

Now that Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan has been suspended, many would say she was being silenced. That is far from the truth. Her suspension was on the basis of what the senate perceived as unruly behavior on the floor. We are yet to hear the details of her sexual harassment allegations and I believe that she has avenues to ventilate that. Nigerians earnestly await these details, which should be salacious enough to help us cool off some heat.