Politics
Of Governance And Clamour For Unicameral NASS
Although the heavy cost of maintaining Nigeria’s 469 federal lawmakers has always been a source of concern, “sitting politicians’’ have joined in the campaign for the reduction of the number of federal legislators.
In fact, one of the converts even suggested the scrapping of the Senate, as according to him, it is the House of Representatives that represents.
The converts: Gov. Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti; Sen. Rochas Okorocha, former governor of Imo and Chief Osita Chidoka, former Minister of Aviation, made their suggestions at different fora.
Chidoka who advocates for a unicameral legislature, made the suggestion after President Muhammadu Buhari presented the 2020 budget.
“In Nigeria, we need a unicameral legislature with six members each from the 36 states and two members from FCT.
“The legislature with 218 members will be less than 50 per cent of current members and term limit of three terms.
“The 2020 budget for the National Assembly (NASS) is N125bn, higher than the combined budget of Education N48 billion (excluding UBEC and TETFUND), Health N46 billion and Social Investment N30 billion.
“Reducing National Assembly members by half will provide over N60 billion annually for the social sector, that will be 600 billion over 10 years.”
Chidoka said the new National Assembly would be both efficient and economical.
He described the budget of N125 billion for the National Assembly as “hugely extravagant,” in an economy adjudged to have over 100 million poor people with gross infrastructure deficit.
The former Minister of Aviation said that funds saved from the contraction would be available for investment on policies and projects that would serve the common interest of the greater number of the population.
On his part, Fayemi advocated for the scrapping of the Senate in order to save cost and reduce financial burden on the government.
He also advocated for the adoption of Stephen Orosaye’s report which recommended the merging of federal government’s agencies that perform similar functions.
Fayemi said the type of legislative system that would be more productive for Nigeria in this current economic situation is a unicameral legislature.
“As it stands, the country’s legislative arm consisting of 109 Senate members and a 360-member House of Representatives, on yearly basis gulps millions of Naira.
“We do need to look at the size of government in Nigeria, and I am an advocate for a unicameral legislature.
“What we really need is the House of Representatives because that is what represents.
“You have three senators from little Ekiti and you have three senators from Lagos State, I guess the principle is not proportionality, but that if you are a state, you get it automatically.
“But I think that we can do away with that. There are several things that we can do away within the government,” he said.
Okorocha, the immediate past governor of Imo, now the Senator representing Imo West, on his part called for the reduction in the number of federal lawmakers representing a state.
He suggested that a Senator and three members of House of Representatives should represent each state.
“I want one senator and three House of Representatives members per state, which will cut expenses.
“A Senator and three House of Representatives members can do what many have been doing.’’
He said that the reduction in the number of representatives from the states would help cut cost and ensure effective representation.
While advocating for ways to cut cost and ensure effective representation, Okorocha said he would sponsor a bill that would seek for the reduction of the number of Senators and House of Representatives members for each state.
The Conference of Nigeria Political Parties (CNPP), has endorsed the suggestions for the reduction of the number of federal lawmakers.
The CNPP via a statement from its Secretary-General, Willy Ezugwu, said Okorocha spoke the truth concerning the need to reduce cost of running the National Assembly.
“The former governor simply told Nigerians the truth when he said what three Senators from a state can do; one lawmaker is capable of handling the same.
“Like Sen. Okorocha asked, what is too sacrosanct that Senators and House of Representatives members are doing that only a Senator per state can not do?’’
Also, two professors of political science at the University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN), Jonah Onuoha and Aloysius Okolie, agreed with the advocates for unicameral legislature, which they reiterated would reduce the cost of governance.
Onuoha, who is the Head, Department of Political Science, said bicameral legislative system is not cost effective, especially in a country like Nigeria, where federal lawmakers receive bogus salaries and allowances.
“It takes huge amount of money to maintain bicameral legislative system, especially in a country like Nigeria where federal lawmakers receive bogus salaries and allowances monthly.
“Bicameral legislative system is not only costly but delays legislative processes of passing bill into law, since the bill will pass through the two chambers.’’
Onuoha, who is also the Director of American Studies in UNN, urged the country to adopt unicameral legislative system as it is cost effective.
“If the country settles for unicameral, the extra money it could have spent in paying salaries, allowances and maintaining the two chambers which runs into billions can be used to carry out capital projects,” he said.
He said if the country insisted on running bicameral legislative system, the number of lawmakers should be reduced.
Okolie in his contribution said that it was as result of bicameral legislative system that every year the budgetary allocation to the National Assembly had remained the highest.
“I subscribe to opinions in some quarters that the country should adopt unicameral legislative system as it will reduce the cost of running government as well as quicken legislative processes.
“The country is spending much to pay salaries, allowances and maintaining the two chambers — 109 Senators and 360-members of House of Representatives,’’ he said.
Okolie, former Chairman, Academic Staff Union of Universities, UNN branch, also said that as part of measures to reduce cost of running the government, the country should return to the regional structure.
“If we have one federal parliament and one regional parliament in each of the six geo-political zones, it will go a long way in cutting down cost of running the government,” Okolie said.
However, a legal practitioner, Mr Dele Igbinedion, said that people should not clamour for unicameral legislature just for cutting cost, adding that the issue is not whether or not a bicameral legislature is good or bad.
“I believe the bicameral system should remain because it has been proven to be sustainable and necessary. The process of law making is a very serious business which cannot start and end within a short time.
“The problem with the unicameral system which we have at the state level is that a bill can be introduced and passed the same day and sent to the governor for assent.
“This is not the case in the National Assembly; the two chambers must meet and possibly form a joint committee to look at the bill before sending it for presidential assent.
“The rigorous process a piece of legislation has to pass through forms part of the beauty of democracy.
“I think Nigerians should stop looking at the legislature each time there is a slight challenge and asking if we really need that arm of government.
“The judiciary often doesn’t respond to executive excesses, except there is a case it initiates, but in the legislature, a member can raise it as a matter of urgent public importance, national importance or ethics and privileges, and the attention of the parliament can be brought to it.’’
Apparently, Igbinedion was surmising that many state assemblies have become rubber stamps because the governors could easily “conquer’’ them, because it is only a single chamber.
Stakeholders say that unicameral and bicameral legislature have their advantages, but the country should settle for an option that cuts costs and wastages.
Ukoh writes for News Agency of Nigeria(NAN).
Obike Ukoh
Prof. Amupitan gave the warning on Saturday, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, during the South-South Zonal Readiness Assessment and Interactive Staff Engagement organised ahead of the 2027 general elections.
He said insecurity remained a potential challenge to the electoral process but stressed that the Commission would not allow threats against its personnel to undermine its constitutional responsibilities.
“Insecurity may pose a challenge, but our collective constitutional resolve is far stronger. Let me again send a clear message from Port Harcourt: anyone who attempts to threaten, intimidate, or harm our ad-hoc staff, NYSC members, or permanent personnel will be brought to justice under the full weight of the law,” he said.
The INEC Chairman, who was accompanied by National Commissioners, directors and technical aides, disclosed that the South-South engagement was the fifth in a series of zonal assessments, following similar exercises in the South-West, North-West, South-East and North-East.
He explained that his physical presence across the geopolitical zones reflected the Commission’s field-first approach, emphasising that electoral integrity must be established through effective operations at the grassroots.
According to him, the assessment would cover operational preparedness across the 123 Local Government Areas in the six South-South states.
On election security, Prof. Amupitan said INEC had moved away from reactive security arrangements traditionally activated around election day to a proactive, intelligence-driven framework known as the “ICCES Tentacle”.
He explained that the framework was designed to extend inter-agency security coordination from national and state headquarters to local government areas and Registration Area Centres, including remote communities.
He identified three critical pillars of the framework as mapping and mitigating security threats, protecting electoral personnel and infrastructure, and guaranteeing safe access to polling units.
The INEC boss said the security arrangement would provide comprehensive protection for electoral personnel, technological infrastructure, including Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) devices and server infrastructure, as well as voters.
He added that the framework was intended to ensure that every polling unit, irrespective of its geographical location or history of security challenges, remained safe and accessible for the exercise of democratic rights.
Prof. Amupitan disclosed that the South-South security architecture comprised approximately 60 major operational formations, headquarters and state commands operating under the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES).
The network, he said, brings together military, naval, air, police and other security and intelligence agencies across the six states.
“Together, this integrated multi-agency network represents the operational backbone that guarantees intelligence-led protection across every riverine creek, coastal axis, and land-based polling unit in the Niger Delta,” he stated.
Providing an overview of the region’s electoral significance, the INEC Chairman said the South-South had the fourth-largest voting bloc in the country, with 15,823,550 registered voters, representing 15.30 per cent of the national register.
Rivers State alone, he said, accounts for 3,736,434 registered voters spread across the 23 local government areas.
Alhaji Abubakar made the demand following revelations that some INEC registration officers allegedly abused their access to the voter registration system to introduce irregular records into the database.
In a statement issued by his Director of Strategic Communications, Mr Phrank Shaibu, the former vice-president described the development as a serious breach of the Commission’s internal safeguards and raised concerns about the integrity of the electoral process.
He urged INEC to identify the officials implicated in the alleged misconduct and explain what disciplinary or legal measures had been taken against them.
Alhaji Abubakar also called for an independent forensic audit of the preliminary voters’ register to establish the scale of the alleged manipulation, identify affected records and determine how the questionable entries were introduced into the system.
He further insisted that INEC preserve all relevant voter records, image files, system access logs and electronic audit trails to prevent the destruction or alteration of evidence before an independent examination could be conducted.
The former vice-president also demanded that the Commission disclose the identities of companies contracted to produce sensitive election materials ahead of the 2027 polls, arguing that transparency was essential to building public confidence in the electoral process.
INEC’s Director of Information and Communication Technology, Dr Lawrence Bayode, had earlier disclosed during a television interview that some registration officers across the country allegedly used their official login credentials to introduce irregularities into the voters’ database.
Dr Bayode explained that the Commission’s Automated Biometric Identification System helped identify questionable records and establish how some irregularities entered the system.
He, however, clarified that not all suspicious photographs were AI-generated, as some resulted from poor registration procedures.
The development followed public concerns over suspected AI-generated photographs, alleged duplicate entries and other inconsistencies discovered in the preliminary voters’ register published online on October 26, 2026.
INEC has maintained that the published document is a preliminary register and that it is reviewing questionable records ahead of the certification of the final Register of Voters.
The controversy has intensified calls for greater transparency and accountability in the management of the voters’ register as preparations gather momentum for the 2027 general elections.
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