With the increasing insecurity in the country, why did the Senate not want to investigate the defence and security spending?

No serious public official can pretend any longer on the issue of insecurity. That’s a serious problem. Some will argue and say the situation is getting better or worse. The more important question for me is not just to categorise it one way or the other. Sometimes it gets worse before it gets good. Let me put it in the context of what we saw happen on the Senate floor last week. The motion asked for the setting up of a national committee to investigate all financial releases made to the military in the prosecution of the war on banditry, kidnapping and terror.

We don’t think that’s the way to go and we’re not going to pretend otherwise. Our military institutions are doing their best in the first instance in extraordinarily difficult circumstances. Let’s remember this is not traditional warfare. The same military fought Boko Haram terrorists and dislodged them. There have been occasions when these terrorists have had their flags flying over communities they have taken. The local governments in this country had become no-go zones for them. When they tried to advance, our military stopped them, destroyed them in the battle and took back these territories. By that time, the terrorists had abandoned open confrontation with our forces and gone underground, splitting into cells and waging a guerrilla war.

For the first time in our nation’s history, a military trained for conventional warfare was suddenly asked to fight an unconventional enemy. Neither the nation nor the military itself had thought of this. But they didn’t give up. The war has been a great sacrifice for them, especially for our officers and soldiers who are dying, the families of those who have been killed or kidnapped and a government that has to handle the most sensitive of information and still be responsible to the people.

When that motion came before the Senate, the question before us was whether we wanted to try our own military in the middle of a war. This would have been the most unpatriotic course of action — out of order, out of tune, and a dangerous mishandling of a sensitive national security situation. It is a settled principle that you don’t ask the price of fighting a war until the war is over. You don’t stop in the middle of a conflict to say: how much have I given you, how much have you spent and how did you spend it? “The priorities have to be understood clearly. Our priority at this moment cannot be to probe our military.” Let me be clear, we were not suggesting that the military should spend money without accountability. We have standing committees namely Army, Air Force, Navy and Defence, that are entrusted with the specific responsibility of overseeing our Armed Forces. They pass budgets, provide oversight and carry out scheduled and unscheduled inspections. Members of the committees have travelled with service chiefs abroad to inspect military equipment procured on behalf of Nigeria. Much of what we are using to prosecute this war is off-the-shelf. Some items are ordered today, but may not be manufactured for the next three months. Before shipping, security consultants and members of the two chambers’ committees conduct physical inspections. The same rigour applies on arrival at our ports and airports.” “We can’t announce every drone that comes in, its specs and operational range as a nation.

You can’t fight a war like that. There is a great deal that cannot be discussed openly on the floor of the Senate or the House of Representatives. In that reality, an agree to a motion to investigate the military publicly would have been a dangerous diversion and that is not where Nigeria’s focus should be today. “What I can tell the public is we’re making great progress, by the grace of God. I know that is hard for many Nigerians to accept, particularly for those who are living through the agony of this crisis. But the increased tempo of attacks in different parts of the country is a part-expression of the frustration of our enemies. They are taking casualties on a scale they never have known before. A lot is happening – both through our own military action and through the results of international counter-terrorism cooperation. ‘We are fighting guerrillas who, for every one they lose, must hit back in retaliation, partly to wage a psychological war, partly to sap public confidence in the military, and partly to turn Nigerians against their own armed forces. We must not let their plan come through. We cannot allow political adversaries who seek to weaponise this situation to deter us from continuing the ongoing onslaught on terrorism.

Some senators recently lost their return tickets. Last week at the plenary, the Senate President had stated that their cases were being handled by the leadership. Is this type of intervention part of the leadership’s remit?

I’ll get straight to it. We went into a brief closed session during our plenary and then returned to hear a report of progress from the President of the Senate. It was perfectly normal in both cases that the President of the Senate, on behalf of the leadership, congratulated the winners of the primary elections. And it is also normal for the leadership to take notice of complaints from senators and members of the House of Representatives regarding irregularities they may have seen in the primaries. The best we can do is to engage the party’s leadership structure – the National Working Committee, the governors of the relevant states and where necessary, Mr. President as the party’s national leader – to reflect those concerns. God has been gracious to me and my people in Ekiti Central supported me and no one contested against me. I was sent back without opposition. And so it was with the President of the Senate and the Deputy President of the Senate. So this was not a personal issue for any of us in leadership.

It was part of our debt to our friends. In fact, some of the members were calling us in the heat of their primaries. Some sent written petitions to the party, copying the leadership. We could not have put together the first Senate and ignored those concerns. Therefore the statement by the President of the Senate was appropriate and fully in accord with parliamentary practice and procedure the world over. Since then, the party’s appeal committee has sat, heard from all complainants and relevant stakeholders and made recommendations to the National Working Committee. That process will decide the final result. Whatever the President of the Senate said, he was not speaking for himself – he was speaking for the leadership and I have now explained the basis on which we acted.

What do you say to the description of the National Assembly as a rubber stamp?

For the last three years we have worked together with the executive arm of government. Some of our colleagues were called rubber stamps for doing that.

But let me be very clear, we knew we were not a rubber stamp Senate. What is different about the 10th National Assembly and other assemblies is that we decided to solve our differences behind closed doors and not in the public domain. …meetings with the National Working Committee of the APC, with Mr. President, with ministers, Chairman, Nigeria Revenue Service, and with relevant agencies before any bills ever came to the floor where we raised objections, pushed back and agreed. Such were, among others, the four great bills for the reform of the taxes.

There have been instances where we sent names back to Mr. President for screening before we even read the cover letters into the record because we had problems with eligibility or concerns that would have made confirmation impossible. The president would order the list revised, a corrected list resubmitted, and the matter proceed without public controversy. What would it have accomplished but to satisfy those who confuse noise with independence, if we’d gone through that process and then thrown a dramatic rejection on the floor? We were not doing this to impress or to avoid criticism.

We felt sure it was the right way to go in a time of unusual national challenge.” Our view has always been that real collaboration between the arms of government, where it is in the overriding public interest, is not a sign of weakness. It’s statesmanship.

“Does the Senate leadership have standing to speak for senators from both sides of the aisle?

And we have that standing, and let me tell you why. As we always say, and mean, when you walk into the hallowed chamber of the Senate, you shed whatever party uniform you wore to get there. You are arriving as a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Much has been said on the establishment of state police. But the process has yet to start despite the growing spate of insecurity. So why the delay?

A – We are firm on our position on state police. “We stand with Nigerians on this matter. A cross-section of the public has made it abundantly clear that there could not be a better time to establish state police than now. And that is where we stand. We, the elected representatives of the people, have a duty to transform this popular desire into law. You can sing about it, argue about it, wish for it, but it doesn’t happen, not until it is legislated.

And this is where Parliament comes in. “We have come to a firm conclusion that we shall pass the constitutional amendment to provide for state police. I can tell you today that this will come to be. There is no need for further delay.

I ought to say something about the work that’s gone into this, too. There have been series of intensive meetings involving the National Assembly led by Chairman, Senate Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution, Senator Barau I. Jibrin and Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution, Rt Hon. Benjamin Kalu

The meetings have included the Office of the Attorney-General, the Chief of Staff to the President, the Inspector General of Police and other key stakeholders. In the past week alone, consultations have been substantial. And that is why I feel confident to talk to you today. “We have agreed to separate the state police amendment from the larger constitutional review agenda so that we can pass it as soon as we can and pass it to the 36 state Houses of Assembly. As you are aware, the bill can only be presented to Mr President for his assent after it has been passed by two thirds of the state assemblies. The President is 100% behind us on this. Most of our governors are also in favour and their respective assemblies are waiting for the bill to come.

It is three or four months now since a bill was introduced to amend the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022 to give stiffer penalties to kidnappers, financiers, informants and people who knowingly support kidnapping operations. Why hasn’t the Senate completed the amendment process?

Legislative process is underway to amend the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022. It means a lot to us. It is something. We have done what we had to do.” The parliament and the executive fully agree that it is the right thing to do. “You will have read some of the recent pronouncements of our courts sentencing persons convicted of kidnapping to death, independently. Nothing less is due.

I voted for the bill for the sake of peace and stability of Nigeria. I can assure Nigerians very strongly that process will be concluded. We have passed some of the bills that will further ensure the stability of our fatherland. Some are in progress and require accompanying constitutional amendments. We have put together this list of such bills so that we can act together.” But, as I said, we are specifically isolating the state police amendment so that it is dealt with at once. We will return to the other critical constitutional issues including the bill on special seats for women in the legislature, and several other reforms needed to advance our democracy. We still have until June 2027 and we will take care of them all in due time.

Can you identify parliamentary interventions championed by the National Assembly to cushion the adverse effects of economic reforms by this administration?

A – One of the things that we have done and we will continue to do more intensely is to respond to our constitutional mandate under Section 14(2). This makes us to enact laws that promote security and welfare of Nigerians as the primary purpose of government. You will see that in the laws that we have passed and that have now received presidential assent, there are several that have led to the creation of agencies and frameworks to take care of the welfare of ordinary Nigerians. For instance, the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) was established by an Act of the National Assembly. Its aim is to make tertiary education accessible and available to all students, regardless of their background. We also passed legislation to establish the Federal Ministry of Livestock Development. It aims to address the economic aspect of farming and animal husbandry, but also the security and social tensions that have arisen from the long-standing conflict between farmers and herders. The tax reform bills addressed the issue of double taxation and made life better for Nigerians in the lower income brackets. For instance, nobody earning N80,000 and below will pay any income tax at all at the new minimum wage. This reform is important with respect to the number of Nigerians who are in this income bracket. Also, businesses with annual turnover of less than N50 million can now operate without the burden of corporate tax. This bracket again includes a very large proportion of Nigerian businesses. These are not beauty procedures.” These are structural reforms that will help mitigate the impact of the broader economic policies of this administration.

Open grazing still remains a national issue due to its grave implications on Nigeria’s economy and security. What is on the agenda of the National Assembly for a definitive solution to this issue?

A – This is a question that reflects the concern of a great many Nigerians and it deserves a candid answer. The government is doing what it takes. But this is more than a policy announcement or a piece of legislation. It needs wide consultations of all the stakeholders. Open grazing is a sensitive topic. It’s about deeply held and long-held beliefs about land rights, rights of way and centuries-old traditions. On the one hand we have herders whose ancestors have travelled certain routes for generations. On the other you have farmers whose livelihoods are ruined by cattle passing through their fields. Each side feels its rights are being violated. But, it’s not enough to fix this problem by the force of law. The government’s work is to fix this issue by real engagement that brings everyone along. What differentiates a democratic government from a military regime is indeed the difference between governing by dialogue and governing by decree. Sensitive issues take more time to solve. From outside it may seem that we were not doing anything. But there’s movement. I am sure the Ministry of Livestock Development will be able to give the progress report to the public very soon. When the proper framework is finally in place, it will make a huge difference.

The Senate Standing Orders, 2026 has limited the contest of the Senate Presidency to leadership alone. What prompted the Senate’s decision?

The Senate has done what is fully consistent with world parliamentary practice, procedure, conventions and traditions. This is called ranking, a principle that applies to the seating arrangement, but also to the priority of participation in the legislative business, including which senator gets to speak when several senators want to speak at the same time. The principle is simple: a senator in his second or third term is presumed to be more familiar with the rules, more experienced in parliamentary procedure and more responsible for guiding and stabilizing the process. This is the assumption behind the global parliamentary ranking system .

The longer you serve in a legislative chamber, the more you’re expected to know how it operates and to help guide its proceedings. Now, in this particular amendment that is before us, you can’t just walk in as a first-time member to be the President of the United States Senate or the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives. The fact that no such rule existed in our Senate three years ago is not an argument against our decision to introduce the global best practice of parliamentary governance. The law is growing. The National Assembly’s specific function is to improve and revise the rules by which it operates. The dress that fitted us in 2023 does not fit us today, and Parliament is the tailor.

Is this the decision to reinstate Senator Godswill Akpabio as Senate President?

You cannot pass a law targeting one individual. Such a law will not withstand constitutional review. What you can do is to pass a law that will endure, that is based on principle, that is consistent with democratic best practice. And that is exactly what we have done. I was not on the Senate floor when elements of this amendment were voted on. But I came back on the first legislative day and I moved a substantive motion to draw the attention of the Senate to provisions within the amendment, which in my view were inconsistent with the Constitution.

The 1999 Constitution provides that any Act of the National Assembly that is inconsistent with its provisions shall be null and void. The Senate took my motion and struck out those offending provisions. One of those provisions was that a senator must be sworn in before he or she can contest to be Senate president. The intention is obvious. The Presidency of the Senate should not be a second option for anyone, either through the door for the leadership contest or through the window to their previous office if they fail to get the leadership position. It is very clear on this point. Once you are sworn-in as a member of the National Assembly, you lose any executive office that you may have held before.

The Senate’s investigation of the Missing Police Firearms is not finished. This applies to other adhoc committees established by the Senate to investigate specific issues of national interests including ways and means. Why don’t these probes tell us more?

The Public Accounts Committee is a constitutional organ. It is not, as is the case with most other Senate committees, created at the whim of the leadership. In fact, only two of the 25 committees of Parliament have a constitutional basis – the Committee on Appropriations and the Public Accounts Committee. By law, custom and practice, the ruling party controls the Appropriations Committee, and the Public Accounts Committee is chaired by a member of the minority opposition. That’s how it’s designed. It is part of the architecture of transparency and accountability of democratic … We do not want the work of the Public Accounts Committee to be misunderstood. Its proceedings need not be structured as investigations that end in a named indictment or penalty. The committee serves as an ombudsman or internal auditor. The Office of the Auditor General is also in the executive arm for that purpose. I encourage the public to read the Annual Reports of the Auditor General. They are remarkable for the depth of scrutiny they contain. It is often from these reports that the Public Accounts Committees of both chambers get their first inkling.

The idea is to hold agencies accountable, perhaps to animate them and to make them responsive. Not everything that happens in the National Assembly has to be public. Even when we go into executive session, we follow the parliamentary convention of reporting progress to the media — summarising, in broad terms, what was discussed behind closed doors.

The Public Accounts Committee also functions in this way. I know of a number of issues which the Public Accounts Committee dealt with at the beginning of the 10th National Assembly. Some have been resolved by intervention either by the agency concerned providing documentary evidence to refute the allegations or other legitimate reasons. At times in the course of a committee’s proceedings, it must weigh the larger implications of its actions: What is the effect on current investors? What is the reputational risk to the sector? What is the position under the current laws like the Petroleum Industry Act? Has the original situation that triggered the concern already been addressed under the current administration? These are valid questions that by their nature can’t always be aired publicly. These are considerations which, when they do come into play, can slow the visible progress of the work of a committee, thereby giving the impression from the outside that nothing is going on or that a compromise has been struck.

Now, no self-respecting senator would want his name to be associated with starting a probe and then abandoning it. That would mean compromise and that is not the driver of these outcomes.” I personally chaired the Joint Committee set up to investigate alleged economic sabotage in the Nigerian Petroleum Industry. Some of you asked me if the probe would end up like the previous ones. I promised you. There was so much that happened that the media couldn’t cover.

The committee never formally published its findings but much happened. The industry saw a shakeup in leadership. That’s the kind of behind-the-scenes cooperation between the legislature and the executive that yields real results, even if the public record appears to be lacking. Public interest over the interest of the parties.

Some parts of the INEC Guidelines were recently ruled against by a court. Would National Assembly consider amendment to Electoral Act with this court decision?

Let’s be honest. I personally listened to a former Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mike Ighini analyse the 2026 Electoral Act at a point. Although he had some valid points, some of his conclusions reflected a fundamental misunderstanding of the legislative intent behind several of the provisions he was criticising.

And that’s the beauty of the system of democracy that we have and the system of separation of powers. We are the legislature. We make law. The President shall either assent to a law or withhold assent. The judiciary interprets the law and determines its legality. If the court has ruled that some parts of the INEC Guidelines for Election are void. “So be it. That is how the system is supposed to work within the framework of competent judicial power.

“Immediately after those rulings some of my colleagues suggested that we should go back to the National Assembly to amend the Electoral Act, I did not support that course of action. I was not going to be part of amending an electoral law as the Leader of the Senate few days to primaries or months to a general election in an atmosphere where each party is accusing the other of manipulating the process and INEC is under huge pressure from all sides.

Any amendment to the Electoral Act, 2026 should be done after the elections are over. It must contain the express caveat that no amendment shall have any retroactive effect on elections already held. So fixed is my resolve.

Another court has ruled illegal the N110 billion for vehicles and allowance schemes of the National Assembly. What is the National Assembly’s position on this court decision?

All allowances received by parliamentarians – federal and state – should be fully published for the public once and for all. I actually think if that happened, the biggest beneficiaries of that transparency could actually be legislators. Today a constituent may come to me and say he needs N250,000 for his child’s tuition fees and I am able to give him N50,000 or N100,000 for example. He leaves not knowing whether he should thank me because he has no idea how many other people are asking me for the same thing or what my actual resources are.

The mystery surrounding legislative pay breeds conjecture. This is a case where assumption is not in favour of legislators. I want to put two things on the record straight. First off, legislators don’t determine their own pay. “We are being paid by Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission. We are unable to fix it. Second, the cars assigned to senators and members of the House of Representatives are not personal property. They are official cars, provided for constituency work and legislative duties. It is not different in principle from the official cars given to directors, permanent secretaries and ministers throughout the executive arm of government. That difference is almost never made public. It ought to be. This is not peculiar to Nigeria. Parliamentary institutions are rarely popular. In many countries, oversight is inconvenient, so members of the executive find legislators inconvenient. If you are really holding agencies and ministries to account you will attract enmity. That is the kind of work it is. I will say this, the issue of publishing legislative remuneration is one I think we have to address as we prepare for a New Assembly. My stance is clear. The Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission must publish in full what each category of public office holder earns – members of the National Assembly, members of the State Houses of Assembly, ministers, and all other relevant categories. That settles the matter for good. You can bet the bank on that.

Please highlight the Senate’s key achievements in the last 36 months and also its low points?

I am always reluctant to enumerate accomplishments in a country in which so many of our people are plagued by insecurity, economic difficulty and daily challenges. In such circumstances patriotism and modesty forbid self-congratulation.

You wanted to know, so I will tell you. Okay, let me start with our lovest point. The low point was when the outside world thought there was disorder on the floor of the Senate, that we didn’t have internal cohesion, that we had been disrespectful to the female gender, that we weren’t operating as an institution. It wasn’t about legislation or governance in that period, but it was about the conversation every day in the media. It was about the suspension of a senator, the propriety of the penalty, and the internal politics of the House.

That was a painful diversion from the work we were doing.” It was bigger than anything else. I don’t have any good memories of that time.

Still, we have done well in these times of trials. The Senate has done a lot in conjunction with the executive arm to stabilise the economy. We have legislated in almost every sphere, be it agriculture, education, health, banking and finance, securities and foreign exchange regulation. We have provided oversight to ensure that agencies use appropriated funds for their intended purposes. We have laid a foundation through the four tax reform bills which I think are really revolutionary, and that foundation will start to change the non-oil sector of this economy in particular.

What are your personal achievements as Senate Leader and representative of Ekiti Central?

I have sponsored over 70 bills in the National Assembly. More than 50 percent of these bills are private member bills that I have introduced as part of my own legislative program. In the first two years alone, seven of those bills have directly led to the establishment of at least six federal institutions. The institutions include University of Agricultural and Development Studies, which has been signed into law and is now fully functional. The Federal University of Technology and Environmental Sciences, Ekiti is now in its maiden academic session. The Conversion of the Federal Polytechnic, Ado-Ekiti and the Yaba College of Technology to Federal University of Technology. Another tertiary institution, the Federal University of Science and Technology, Epe, in Lagos State, has also been established.

Apart from education, the first bill I sponsored as a Senator in this Assembly was the bill to restore Nigeria’s original national anthem which Mr. President assented to on the 11th June, 2023. This was sung as our National Anthem the following day which was Democracy Day, 12th June, 2023.

The work of this Senate has had consequences in different ways – fundamental and symbolic. We have more to do, and we will.