By Rt. Hon Eseme Eyiboh mnipr

The judgment of the Court of Appeal delivered on Monday, February 9, 2026, represents a consequential affirmation of the constitutional principles that sustain Nigeria’s democratic order and the orderly functioning of its institutions.

By upholding the disciplinary actions of the Senate as lawful and procedurally sound, the Court has robustly reinforced the doctrine of separation of powers, a cornerstone of our constitutional democracy. The ruling confirms with unmistakable clarity that the authority of the Senate to regulate its internal proceedings and discipline its members is firmly rooted in the Constitution and its Standing Orders. This authority is neither incidental nor ornamental; it is an essential responsibility entrusted to the legislature to preserve order, decorum, and institutional integrity in the discharge of its duties on behalf of the Nigerian people.

The Court of Appeal has further enriched our constitutional jurisprudence by clearly delineating the proper limits of judicial intervention in the internal affairs of a co-ordinate arm of government. While reaffirming the judiciary’s vital role as guardian of fundamental rights, the judgment recognises that the legislature must retain the autonomy necessary to enforce its rules and maintain discipline, provided it acts within the province of the law. This equilibrium is indispensable to effective governance and democratic stability.

The circumstances that gave rise to this litigation are regrettable. Parliamentary democracy rests on respect for established rules, collective responsibility, and due deference to the authority of the Chair. Persistent refusal to comply with lawful directives of the Presiding Officer—including the reallocation of seating arrangements within the chamber—as well as failure to appear before the statutory Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions, runs counter to the ethos of parliamentary conduct. Such actions risk undermining institutional authority and distracting from the Senate’s higher obligations of legislation, oversight, and representation in the national interest.

While the Court of Appeal set aside the contempt proceedings and the associated fine on procedural grounds, it is significant that the core findings affirming the Senate’s disciplinary powers and the validity of its actions remain undisturbed. This distinction reinforces both the primacy of due process and the legitimacy of institutional self-regulation under the Constitution.

As the Senate moves forward, it remains steadfast in its constitutional mandate to foster robust debate, exercise rigorous oversight, and enact legislation that advances the peace, order, and good government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. In keeping with the spirit of reconciliation and institutional maturity that must guide democratic leadership, the Senate looks ahead with restraint, goodwill, and an abiding commitment to collective purpose rather than past grievance.

In this spirit, the Senator concerned, who has since resumed legislative duties, is expected to continue her duties with renewed adherence to parliamentary rules, mutual respect, and the shared responsibilities that bind all members of the National Assembly.

The strength of our democracy ultimately lies in the strength of its institutions, each operating responsibly within its recognised constitutional remit. The judgment of the Court of Appeal fortifies that foundation and renews the resolve to build a disciplined, stable, and forward-looking legislature in service of the Nigerian people.

The facts have spoken for themselves

God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Rt. Hon. Eseme Eyiboh, MNIPR
Special Adviser, Media/Publicity and Official Spokesperson
to the President of the Senate

By Hon. Eseme Eyiboh, MNIPR

In politics, silence is often louder than speech, for it speaks in the language of calculation and consequence. Forgiveness, when declared by a powerful man, is louder still—a thunderclap in a quiet chamber. It unsettles expectations, invites suspicion, and demands interrogation, not because it is weak, but because power is never presumed innocent when it chooses mercy.

When Senate President Godswill Akpabio, GCON, announced his New Year resolution to forgive all offenders and withdraw every suit he had instituted, Nigeria’s political class instinctively reached for its usual tools—cynicism, calculation, conspiracy. This decision, however, does not fit comfortably within the margins of the country’s familiar scripts of power and vendetta; it demands a slower reading.
The context itself matters. On New Year’s Day 2026, Akpabio was not behind a podium, flanked by politicians. He was seated in Sacred Heart Parish, Uyo, listening to a homily—not as Nigeria’s number-three citizen, but as a humble, God-fearing parishioner. The priest, Reverend Father Donatus Udoette, preaching with quiet authority and pastoral fervor, exhorted his congregants to let go of past hurts and choose peace over grievance. Akpabio would later say that, at some point, he realised the sermon was speaking directly to him.

The announcement that followed shortly after bore the unmistakable imprint of that moment. About nine defamation suits would be withdrawn, including the ₦200 billion case against Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, arising from allegations he had consistently denied and publicly rejected. Other cases, some involving his close associates, would go the same way. In a political culture where litigation has become an extension of reputation management, this was no minor gesture. Akpabio had been unapologetic about defending his name through the courts. The law, in his hands, had been both shield and sword. To voluntarily lay it down is to interrupt a habit of power.

The question, therefore, is not whether Akpabio could afford to forgive. It is why he chose to do so.
To answer that, one must resist the temptation to isolate this act from the man’s broader leadership story. Akpabio has always lived publicly in dual registers. There is the assertive politician who, as governor of Akwa Ibom State, left behind concrete evidence of ambition fulfilled—flyovers, boulevards, hospitals, model schools, an international airport, and an international stadium. Supporters invoke the Latin phrase res ipsa loquitur: the facts speak for themselves.

Then there is the other register: the man who frames his political journey in spiritual terms; who describes his rise from the shadows to national limelight as evidence of divine ordering and grace; who once called himself, without irony, “the most ranked Christian in government.” A man who sees himself not merely as a participant in Nigeria’s politics, but as an instrument within a providential design—God’s will, he believes, for Nigeria at this moment.

In Nigeria, faith in politics is common. Stability of faith is rarer. Akpabio’s Christianity is not episodic. It has shaped how he understands authority itself. Power, in this worldview, is not merely seized or negotiated; it is entrusted. And what is entrusted carries moral obligation.

This is where forgiveness ceases to be sentimental and becomes political philosophy.
The same drive for tangible outcomes has characterised, albeit differently, his tenure as Senate President. It has been defined less by flamboyance than by control. The Senate he leads has been unusually productive and notably calm—more than ninety-six bills passed in two years, with over fifty-eight assented to by the President. In a chamber once notorious for theatrics, this stability is not accidental. It reflects a leadership style that values restraint over spectacle and consensus over conquest.
While his action was inspired, it also makes political sense. Withdrawing defamation suits fits neatly into this logic. Legal battles consume attention. They tether leaders to old grievances. They narrow the emotional bandwidth required for institutional leadership. To let them go is to reclaim focus—and to recommit to what ultimately matters: nation-building.
Critics will argue that forgiveness is easier from a position of strength. They are right. That is precisely why it matters. In fragile political systems, restraint by the powerful sets a tone no code of conduct can enforce. It lowers the temperature. It changes incentives.
Nigeria’s public sphere has become deeply adversarial. Every disagreement is framed as insult. Every critique is personalised. Politics has learned to confuse hostility with toughness. In such an environment, Akpabio’s choice rightly disrupts a dangerous rhythm.
Faith provides the language; humility provides the discipline. Humility here is not self-effacement. No one can accuse Akpabio of being unaware of his own stature. Rather, it is a confidence that does not require constant vindication. As the late global gospel icon, Uma Ukpai, once told him: “Only fruit-bearing trees draw missiles. If you are drawing missiles, it means you are bearing fruit.”
To accept that counsel is to understand leadership as emotional labour. To forgive is not to deny injury; it is to refuse to let injury define governance.
There is, of course, a strategic dimension. Nigerian politics does not permit innocence. The decision comes at a time when Senate unity is under constant scrutiny and rumours of internal challenge circulate freely. Choosing reconciliation over escalation strengthens institutional cohesion. It preserves authority without making it brittle.
Yet strategy does not cancel sincerity. In Nigerian leadership, the sacred and the secular are not opposing realms but overlapping obligations. Godswill Akpabio’s Catholic identity, deeply rooted in his home state, has always been both personal and public. He has hosted bishops at the national level. He is planning a worship centre within the National Assembly complex. These are not gestures of convenience; they are expressions of a worldview in which governance, godliness, and morality intersect.
This is why the withdrawal of lawsuits should be read not merely as personal forgiveness but as public modelling. Akpabio has often spoken of nation-building as a collective task, insisting that it requires citizens to rise above division and embrace shared purpose. Forgiveness, in this sense, becomes civic pedagogy.
Nigeria suffers from obvious physical infrastructure deficits. It also suffers from what might be called spiritual infrastructure decay. Distrust is habitual. Anger is efficient. Leaders who demonstrate emotional regulation contribute to national repair in ways budgets cannot capture.
The implications extend directly into legislative leadership. Managing one hundred and nine senators with competing ambitions requires more than procedural mastery. It demands moral authority—authority that flows not only from rules, but from example.
By choosing forgiveness over litigation, Akpabio strengthens his hand not through coercion but through credibility. He signals that power can afford generosity; that leadership does not require perpetual combat; that not every insult deserves a reply.
There is risk, of course. Forgiveness can be misread as weakness. Silence can be exploited. But leadership that waits for perfect safety rarely leads. Akpabio’s resolution accepts vulnerability as the price of example.
What emerges, then, is a synthesis: the force of developmental leadership from his gubernatorial years, the finesse of institutional management as Senate President, obedience to God and now a claim to moral authority through public restraint.
Nigeria often produces leaders who deliver material progress but corrode trust, or leaders who speak ethically but govern ineffectively. Akpabio’s gesture attempts to collapse that false choice.
To be clear, the true test lies ahead. Forgiveness must be sustained, not performed once and shelved. Its power will be measured by whether it cools tempers, reshapes conduct, and encourages reciprocal restraint.
For now, Akpabio has offered an unconventional lesson in Nigerian statecraft: that surrendering legal claims can strengthen authority; that stable faith produces calm rather than noise; and that humility, properly understood, is not the absence of confidence but its highest expression.
In a country struggling to rebuild trust while confronting insurgency, economic hardship, and climate anxiety, reconciliation is not a luxury. It is governance.
Sometimes, the most radical act in politics is not retaliation, but restraint. And with his New Year’s resolution, Senator Godswill Akpabio, the Senate President has demonstrated precisely that.

Rt Hon Eseme Eyiboh mnipr is the Special Adviser, Media/Publicity and Official Spokesperson to the President of the Senate

Your Excellency, in the last three (3) years, I have not spent my Christmas holidays in Kaduna State. I usually visit my village in Iviukwe-Agenebode, Edo State, at least to change my environment. In my previous years of spending Christmas and New Year in Kaduna State, it was almost like a period of mourning for me due to the level of social capital that had degenerated during the past administration as a result of the level of insecurity and other economic policies that stiffened almost the entire economy. During those days, Kaduna State became a town of terror and intimidation. Hence, celebrating Christmas was not fun, and this affected the economy in a manner that must have been a threat to the integral development of the people living in Kaduna State.

I decided to have my yuletide holidays last year, 2025, in Kaduna State. The home of my birth and presently a place I call home, where my children are raised and nurtured.. As a young child growing up in Kaduna, I have so many undesired memories, and at the same time, I also have many beautiful memories of love. kindness celebrations and the kind of social capital that values relationships amongst Christians and Muslims.

I grew up in Kaduna, where connections and networks replete with community life never made us understand if anything like Kaduna North and Kaduna South existed. Those memorable years, we all from different religions celebrated the Yuletide together and also on some occasions breakfast together during Ramadan. We anticipated the Ramadan fast because that was when we had the opportunity to have the evening coco (pap) and kosai (bean cake), commonly used for breaking of fast with our Muslim families in the neighborhood. Then, we never understood the language known as “religious discrimination”. Christians lived in Kaduna North, just as Muslims would simplistically live in Kaduna South.

Your Excellency, under your watch, Kaduna State has gone back to the glorious days. During my holidays at the Yuletide, 2025, I experienced a glimpse of my childhood of the early 80s as I saw Kaduna town becoming a twenty-four-hour moment of social enterprise and an increase in social activities that made the town a destination for many from different parts of Nigeria. Kaduna became a beehive of different people, and even foreigners were seen from different races during the Yuletide under your watch. The level of fear and intimidation from the law enforcement agent has reduced to the point of allowing free movement of vehicles without having to stop and search.

Under your watch, Your Excellency, the level of criminality has reduced in the Kaduna metropolis. People moved day and night, walking on the streets and driving their vehicles. Even the “Okada men” (known as motorcycle riders who are involved in the business of logistics and transportation) were not sleeping at night but working and earning their daily income. Most shops in Kaduna South are now open for 24hours, a rare situation in the previous administration. Under your watch, I strongly believe the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) has had a boost (I will leave this to the expert to confirm).

I am very much aware that under your watch, the presence of the Kaduna State Government was feasible at the 2025 Kaduna Unity Christmas Carol, organized by the Kaduna State Government in collaboration with the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Kaduna State Chapter. I listened to you and appreciated the fact that you stressed that Kaduna State thrives best when people of all faiths coexist peacefully, reaffirming your administration’s commitment to inclusive governance. This is exactly what democracy delivers. Under your watch, Kaduna state is fast becoming an Open Society, which is also fast translating into respecting individual freedoms and democratic processes as a way to promote gradual, rational reforms in open societies.

Your Excellency, it is these democratic processes you have inculcated in Kaduna State that, under your watch, it is hardly