Akpabio vs Opeyemi: The Senate’s Latest Episode of Legislative Lunacy
Diran King
The hallowed halls of Nigeria’s Senate, where the nation’s most “distinguished” minds gather to debate matters of grave national importance, have once again descended into glorious farce. The latest episode? A near-physical altercation between Senate President Godswill Akpabio and Senate Leader Michael Opeyemi Bamidele—two grown men, both sworn to uphold the dignity of the legislature, now reduced to squabbling like market women over the most pressing of national crises: ‘when to go on vacation’.
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It began, as these things often do, with a simple question: Should the Senate adjourn for recess ‘this week or ‘next week’? A matter so trivial that even a primary school student council might resolve it with a quick vote. But not Nigeria’s Senate. No, here, such decisions require the delicate diplomacy of a UN peacekeeping mission, and the temperament of a Nollywood action film.
Senator Ali Ndume, perhaps the only man in the chamber still clinging to the naive belief that governance should involve basic competence, dared to point out that the leadership had failed to agree on the matter ‘before’ bringing it to the floor. For this grave sin of expecting coordination, he was swiftly reminded that logic has no place in the Red Chamber.
Then came the main event. Bamidele, his frustration boiling over like a poorly supervised pot of egusi soup, declared before his peers that he was fed up with Akpabio’s “autocratic” leadership. “I might resign!” he thundered, as if the mere threat of his departure would send shockwaves through the republic. Akpabio, ever the statesman, responded with the measured grace of a man who has long forgotten that he is supposed to be a public servant. “Sit down!” he barked, flexing his political pedigree like a retired wrestler reminding everyone of his glory days. “I’ve been governor, minister, and Senate Minority Leader—I know more than you!”
And there it was—the crux of Nigerian politics laid bare. Not service, not policy, not even the pretense of democracy. Just raw, unfiltered ‘ego’, clashing in real time while the nation watches in equal parts amusement and despair.
This, of course, is not the first time whispers of fisticuffs have echoed through the Senate’s corridors. Last year, rumors swirled that Akpabio and Bamidele had already come to blows in some backroom scuffle, requiring intervention from a former governor. Bamidele denied it, of course, dismissing the reports as “fake news from a cash-and-carry journalist.” But let’s be honest—if the Senate were a bar, these two would have been thrown out by now for causing a disturbance.
Beneath the theatrics, however, lies the real issue: ‘power, pure and simple’. Bamidele has long grumbled that Akpabio favours Northern senators with plum committee appointments, leaving Southern lawmakers feeling like extras in their own government. Akpabio, meanwhile, has faced accusations of budget manipulation before, most notably in the ‘Ningi saga’, where a senator was suspended for daring to suggest that ‘N3 trillion’ had mysteriously materialized in the national budget.
So while these “distinguished” men bicker over recess dates and personal slights, one must ask: ‘What exactly are they distinguishing themselves in?’ Governance? Hardly. Oratory? Not unless shouting counts. Perhaps it’s in the noble art of ‘political survival’, where loyalty is fleeting, principles are negotiable, and the only real law is self-interest.
Perhaps it’s time for a rebrand. No longer the “Senate”—let’s call it what it is: ‘Nigeria’s Most Expensive Reality Show’, where the stakes are high, the drama is higher, and the only consistent policy is ‘doing whatever keeps you in the game’.
The curtain falls on today’s episode, but rest assured, the show will go on. After all, in this chamber of distinguished chaos, the only thing getting punched is ‘the Nigerian people’s patience.’
Akpabio vs Opeyemi: The Senate’s Latest Episode of Legislative Lunacy