Like a bad, festering sore, the Akpabio-Natasha standoff has refused to abate. It has instead continued to ricochet with rebounds, all tending towards the ludicrous.
The invasive national opprobrium began on Tuesday February 25, 2025, on an innocuous note over seating arrangements during a Senate plenary. Tension had flared, leading to a heated exchange between Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan and the Senate leadership.
According to reports, the controversy began when Senator Natasha’s seat was relocated upon resumption of the session, but she refused to comply with the change. However, what started as an internal tiff soon grew wings and flew out of the hallowed sanctum of the upper legislative chamber and landed in the chatter of public court.
The Kogi senator externalised the whole thing when she consequently appeared on Arise TV and alleged that sexual harassment was behind her altercation with the Senate president, Godswill Akpabio. She had claimed that the Senate president repeatedly blocked a motion she tried to advance in the chamber and then tied his cooperation with her to demands for sexual favour.
She alleged that she was told by Akpabio that the motion could go through if she “took care” of him. “He then said… ‘You can enjoy a whole lot if you take care of me and make me happy,'” she had claimed. She alleged that the change in seating, which sparked a row in the chambers, “was a trap, a set-up,” by Akpabio, who ordered the change. Akpabio, however, promptly denied all the accusations, alleging that Natasha was fond of traumatizing people with baseless, unproven accusations.
The Red Chamber on March 6, 2025 eventually suspended the Kogi Central senator for six months following recommendations by its Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions for failing repeatedly to honour the summons of the committee. That was about 24 hours after her petition formalising her sexual harassment allegations against the Senate president was rejected for allegedly violating Senate procedures.
Now, the Akpabio-Natasha issue has developed a life of its own. Since the senator’s suspension exactly a month ago, no other issue has trended both on the traditional media and the ubiquitous social media more than any other. The Natasha matter has simply become a phenomenon. She is arguably the most searched name on the internet in the last one month.
Somehow, in a society where women are still relatively subjugated and cowed easily, Senator Natasha Apoti-Uduaghan has, through sheer tenacity and grit, been able to rise above every contrivance to silence her, thus keeping the imbroglio sizzling in the cauldron of public opinion.
When her first petition was thrown out by the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions for violating a Senate rule forbidding a member to personally sign a petition to the upper chamber, she brushed the disappointment aside and and promptly arranged for the resubmission of the petition, this time following due process.
The second petition, however, suffered a similar fate. The Senate, which had held contentious sittings over it, at a point stopped further consideration of the petition because it has become a subject of litigation.
The committee chairman, Neda Imaseun, explained that the panel could not continue with the matter because of Order 40(7) of the Senate rules, which provides that “Senate should not receive or deliberate on any matter in which actions are pending in any court of law.”
“Therefore, this matter is closed here at the Senate and it is adjourned sine die,” Imaseun ruled with an air of finality.
Then, from the blues came orchestrated moves by Natasha’s Kogi Central constituents to recall her but the odious move soon fell through. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) explained that it cannot continue the petition seeking her recall because it failed to meet the constitutional requirement. The commission revealed that only 43.86 percent of the registered voters in the five local government areas signed the recall notice.
According to INEC, only 208,132 voters out of the 474,554 registered voters in the constituency, signed the recall notice. This represented only 43.86 per cent of the total votes in Natasha’s Senatorial District; whereas 237,278 votes were needed to meet the requirement. This naturally put an end to the process.
Section 69(a) of the Constitution provides that “A member of the Senate or of the House Representatives may be recalled as such a member if (a) there is presented to the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, a petition in that behalf signed by more than one-half of the persons registered to vote in that member’s constituency alleging their loss of confidence in that member.”
The National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education of the Commission, Sam Olumekun, said in a statement that the commission would no longer take any action on the recall process since the petition has failed the constitutional test.
Again, at the approach of the last Eid-el-Ftri, Natasha decided to fete her constituents as her wont, but the Kogi State government got wind of the embattled senator’s “homecoming,” as the programme was tagged, and resorted to ludicrous moves to scuttle it. It banned all forms of rallies and public gatherings to coincide with Natasha’s planned visit to her constituency.
Every road in her route home bristled with security operatives who mounted watertight barricades along the way just to prevent her from making the trip. However, the embattled senator beat the government’s shenanigans by flying home in an helicopter! She successfully held the programme and a mammoth crowd graced it.
Some of these adversarial contrivances are ostensibly unnecessary because rather break Natasha’s spirit, they are making her popular. She has begun to attract public empathy because she is coming across as an innocent woman being unnecessarily bullied and vilified. Undoubtedly strong-willed, she has stood up to all these overt and covert manoeuvres, emerging as a symbol of defiance.
However, it is crucial to pursue the suit the embattled senator has instituted to contest her six-month suspension slammed on her by the red chamber to the end, to determine the legality or otherwise of the action.
Already, the Federal High Court hearing the matter in Abuja has barred all parties involved in the suit filed against the Senate president and three others from granting press interviews or making public comments on the case.
Now that the Senate has discontinued action on the second petition Natasha submitted to the red chamber because it is already before the court, we admonish that an independent body be raised to dispassionately look into the petition and investigate her sexual harassment allegation against Akpabio to lay the matter to rest by unnerthing the truth or otherwise.
Her petition against both the Senate president and the former governor of Kogi State,Yahaya Bello, already sent to the Inspector-General of Police, alleging a plot to assassinate her should also be investigated. She should be made to provide proof in each case and the outcome of both investigations should be made public.
Akpabio has already denied involvement in the alleged assassination plot and the attempt to recall Natasha. The Kogi State Commissioner for Information and Communication, Kingsley Femi Fanwo, also described the embattled senator’s allegations against his principal, Ahmed Usman Ododo, and his immediate predecessor, Yahaya Bello, as a tissue of lies. He said there was never a discussion between Akpabio and Governor Ododo as well as between the Senate president and Bello about the senator’s recall and assassination as alleged.
The infantile moves by the state government to abridge Natasha’s constitutional rights to freedom of movement in any part of the country as a bonafide citizen generally and go home or visit her constituents particularly are, to say the least, despicable.
Although, Fanwo put up a forceful argument on Channels TV that the ban on rallies and public gatherings was prompted by crisis in some communities in the state, his spirited defence becomes specious against the indefensible barricades mounted by heavily armed security operatives on the route to Natasha’s constituency the same period she planned to fete her constituents for Sallah. What for? All because of a armless woman visiting her constituency?
Hence, the state government should call off moves to possibly arrest her for making the trip home in spite of the so-called ban on rallies. It is simply a witch-hunt and an attempt to trammel a woman trying to palliate her people.
The contrivance to effect her recall from the Senate for having the temerity to confront the powers-that-be has already collapsed as it did not meet the requirement. But if the constituents are convinced that Natasha actually deserves to be recalled, they should relaunch the attempt but they should follow due process and be transparent this time. Real house addresses and definitive contact details of all those involved should be established forensically.
