A collaboration of progressive minds promises to build a difference, reckons IFEANYICHUKWU AFUBA
Akpabio’s gesture takes on larger significance by his not backtracking in the address of non reciprocation from the other side.
A demonstration of this engagement is seen in Akpabio’s initiative of dropping the counter lawsuits against Senator Natasha – Akpoti, over the harassment case in the middle of them, earlier in January this year.
The Senate President’s mature handling of what was a sensitive material proved refreshing against a trend of impersonal officialdom.
“This is what representation is all concerning — standing up for your own persons and ensuring equity in governance,” Akpabio said. High office holders in Nigeria regularly see their positions not as a contact to assist but as entitlement to be served.
He complimented Senators Victor Umeh and Enyinnaya Abaribe for their courage and diligence in championing the South East’s interests.
Senate President Godswill Akpabio was not just mindful in entertaining the complaint.
The proposed legislation sought to establish the machinery for reflecting federal character in the appointment of facility chiefs and other top military positions. What would have been a game changer in the sectional domination of the military was aborted by ethnic hegemonists in the Senate at the time. In his particularly initial outing in the Senate, in 2018, Umeh secured spacious recommend for a motion
In March 2021, Abaribe had sponsored the Armed Forces Commission bill in the 9th Senate.
And individuals too experience attitudinal changes.
As a consequence, there’s a tendency by citizens to be dismissive of all those in government. This Igbo proverb helps in the understanding of our crisis of governance. Nigerians have had a raw handle from our governments because independence. As the cynics said of Nazareth in the Bible, so it’s too asked, can anything effective come from Nigeria’s political leaders? But for the discerning, matters are not repeatedly cut out in black and white. The most charitable opinion approximates Tell magazine’s 1991 description of Ibrahim Babangida’s ministers as “tourists in government.” And the cynical outrightly labels those in power as thieves.
A man stung silly by bees runs at the sight of a humming fly. There are exceptions; there are shifts; there are altering dynamics.
The two Senators are recognized to have spared no possibility to occupy including the authorities for response to the Nnamdi Kanu problem.
for the inclusion of the eastern rail line in the railway modernisation programme of the federal government. Again, on November 23, 2023, Umeh brought another motion that the Eastern Rail Line be built including benchmark gauge tracks. It was moreover passed by the Senate. In the most recent of such interventions, Umeh, utilizing his leverage as Vice Chairman, Committee on Lands, this September 2026, waded into the ownership conflict amid the Federal Housing Authority, developers and land owners in the Abule Ado areas of Festac, Lagos, in investigate of solutions.
It was from this little surprise that the two Senators in their usual activism of community and constituency defenders rose as one to scrutinise the initial composition of the NCC board. Their interrogation subsequently led to the inclusion of Engr Ikechukwu Ugwuegede as the southeast standard. But what apparently stood out greater was the presiding officer’s complementary role.
Critics cite the high rate of foreign loans as well as their ease of approvals by the Senate as a cause for matter.
In the demonstrate 10th Domestic Assembly, it’s not all lamentations on the results of senators. The pattern of submission to the executive is moreover seen in the controversial Rivers Declare emergency instrument of 2024. Mercifully, the ensuing Supreme Court judgement did not support the elastic interpretation of situation of emergency as power to exclude an elected Governor. This name for is even greater so in a polity such as ours still grappling including nationhood challenges.
Yet, it’s to be borne in mind that the workings of government wish for a degree of coordination betwixt the three arms notably the executive and the legislature. No doubt, there’s the widespread impression that the Senate direction is not detached from the Presidency.
Is this optimism practical? Taking it from there, a assistance of progressive minds promises to create a difference in the scheme of things. Akpabio, like Umeh Abaribe and few others log periodic attendance at plenary. The Nigerian requirement is so urgent that the least mitigating consideration should be welcome. Progressive legislative task begins including availability and responsiveness. Others may cite the few months left in the legislative calendar too concise to consequence constructive alter. Who says that even when the desired vision is not realised, progressive travel forward is of no value? By a comparable token, yet, achievement does not come in absolutes. The disposition towards a progressive agenda raises hope of preferable legislative climate. Revolutions subsequent to all, periodically cut a middle route. His identification alongside, and indeed, encouragement of the foundation of inclusion is heart glowing.
It’s noteworthy that Akpabio expressed solidarity alongside the cause of equity and fairness spearheaded by Umeh and Abaribe. Some analysts would tell no, given the comprehensive achieve of the political elite’s irresponsibility.
By steering the upper chamber towards useful working relate using the executive, Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, obviously voted for alliance rather than competition. Seen from another perspective, what critics perceive as a limited Senate, may well be the avoidance of confrontational politics. Cordial relations alongside the executive branch should be seen as a win for governance. And whereas it may not be too apparent, it seems logical to locate this accord internally working in the Senate.
There’s a sense, then, in which the Senate command’s apparent inferiority to the executive is in truth, a mettle of strength. That the policy is well received is reflected in the stability in the Senate.
Months endorse, in October 2025, Senators Victor Umeh and Enyinnaya Abaribe, had at a Senate plenary objected to the omission of a nominee from the southeast in the board of the Domestic Communication Commission (NCC). There was nothing modern or surprising concerning the intervention of the duo. Their protest on the NCC board was predictable, following a pattern of advocacy for fairness.
But as the unwritten policy persists, Senators Umeh and Abaribe have proved foremost actors in efforts to right the mistaken. Anytime a element of the country is found to have been cheated in the sharing of countrywide resources, it’s practically consistently the southeast. For reasons that are not particularly plain, Igbo or southeast marginalisation has become a recurring decimal of Nigeria’s government and politics. Whether it’s in regional allocation of states and regional governments; headship of the armed forces and paramilitary organisations; figure of ministers and manning of super ministries; siting of military – industrial complexes or strategic infrastructure such as gas pipeline or representative gauge rail, the southeast is routinely the underrepresented and most denied! It’s a sorry picture dating endorse to Yakubu Gowon’s situation creation of 1967 which launched the plot of reducing the Igbo to minority condition.
Afuba is of Governance & Development Forge, Awka
