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For Senator Godswill Akpabio, his first 100 days in office as president of the Senate have been uncommon. It has been a journey into recreating perceptions and repositioning the Senate of the Federal Republic to actually serve its purpose for the general good. These 100 days have also presented Akpabio with the opportunity to translate his leadership ideals into concrete deliverables. Nigerians will readily recall with glee how Akpabio’s transformational leadership changed the face of Akwa Ibom State over an eight-year period. During that time, he pulled the state from the lower rungs of the development ladder and brought it up the ladder to a very enviable state. He ensured that Akwa Ibom no longer counted as a major producer of domestic workers and menial job experts. Rather, he revalued human capacity in the state through the provision of facilities that drew proud Akwa Ibomites away from the domestic labour market back into classrooms and further into dignified lifestyles.
In fact, Akpabio’s stewardship in Akwa Ibom was all that he needed to catapult him to the national stage where he was needed. By the end of his tenure of office as governor, many Nigerians looked forward to encouraging him with their votes to become Nigeria’s President. That hasn’t happened yet. And, it is obvious that with his experiences as governor and later senator before advancing to the administration of the Niger Delta region as a minister, and now back to the leadership of the Senate, Akpabio’s road into the future is only but opening.
This is why his first 100 days in office as president of the Senate offer the opportunity to review his leadership of the Red Chamber and, by extension, chairmanship of the National Assembly. For many senators and analysts, the clearest signal that Akpabio has stamped his transformational insignia on the Senate was the rancour-free selection of the Senate committees. His leadership is, perhaps, the first to enjoy a rancour-free selection and constitution of the committees that would drive the development agenda of President Bola Tinubu through strategic oversight of agencies of government in the implementation of the most important act of the legislature, the Appropriation Act.
By effectively delivering on this, Akpabio showed superior understanding. He proved that leadership is best for those who have prepared themselves for the challenges ahead. He also showed that Nigeria’s leadership recruitment process is capable of delivering the best, if those who present themselves for leadership take time to understudy the system and also set their minds on solving problems, not hurtling through them with farcical excuses. Studying to understand where banana peels of the Senate are laid has helped Akpabio navigate his first 100 days seamlessly. The problem many of his predecessors encountered during their time began with the constitution and composition of the Senate committees. Akpabio scaled this hurdle in a very impressive manner.
He also enjoyed a robustly supportive relationship with some workers’ unions, as his strategic intervention proved useful in the suspension of a nationwide strike by resident doctors. The move saved Nigeria some embarrassing moments with the possibility of consequential losses, mostly in human lives, which the strike could have led to. Part of the reasons Nigeria ought not to allow resident doctors to down tools is that health is precious. It is so precious that its management demands the best of attention from those who have committed to doing so. Consequentially, only irresponsible administrators look the other way while doctors down tools, because the principal function of government, as enshrined in the constitution of the federal republic, is the welfare and security of citizens. Security and welfare are omnibus terms. They relate to many things at once. Expanded, they include health security and the welfare of citizens and also of those involved in securing their health.
But the most impactful of Akpabio’s Senate 100 days is his strategic action in leading the Senate to reject the request by President Bola Tinubu to deploy troops of the Nigerian federation towards a military action against neighbouring Niger Republic. The implication of what Akpabio’s Senate did was to indicate to the executive that lines would need to be drawn between reason and emotion. An irrationally emotional Senate would argue that the President must get whatever approval he asks of the Senate just so as to be seen to be in support of the executive. But Akpabio showed that though his Senate is not at loggerheads with the executive, it will not conduct its affairs as a rubber stamp of the executive as its predecessor did even with matters that hurt the federation. Besides, Akpabio led the Senate to show, with the action, that Nigeria’s Senate does not legislate for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), despite Nigeria being its chair. This is one area where most Nigerians applauded the Senate for standing with them against any act of military intervention in the Nigerien leadership change.
Hon. Eseme Eyibo, Special Adviser to the President of the Senate on Media and Public Affairs, commenting on Akpabio’s first 100 days, said the Senate President has shown commitment to the cause of good governance while focusing on deliverables that will uplift the quality of life of the Nigerian.
According to him, the Senate’s suspension of its vacation to screen ministerial nominees through odd hours and non-legislative days was a show of leadership commitment to the cause of good governance. He also said that Akpabio led the Senate to show sensitivity towards the economic pains that Nigerians are faced with by leading the Senate through the rejection of the proposal for a 40 percent increase in electricity tariff, which would have increased the burden on Nigerians in the face of dwindled resources.
He said: “The diligence in the ministerial nominees screening, which occasioned the decline on the approval of three nominees, asserts the Nigerian Senate on a strong pedestal of institutional integrity.”
It is this institutional integrity that most Nigerians look forward to seeing Akpabio and his team enshrine in the annals of the Senate such that the next 100 days will come with remarkable progress in making the Senate a true voice of the voiceless by ensuring that the Appropriation Act is efficiently implemented for the uncommon development and uncommon growth of Nigeria.
