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Nigeria’s Deputy speaker Benjamin Kalu emerges Chairman, African Union
In a recognition of his parliamentary skills and contributions, Nigeria’s Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Benjamin Kalu, has been elected as the Chairman of the Monetary and Financial Affairs Committee of the Pan-African Parliament (PAP) with Hon. Senator Christine Mwando Katempa (Democratic Republic of Congo) named Deputy Chairman.
The Chairmanship of the Monetary and Financial Affairs Committee, which is one of the highest positions zoned to the West African caucus of the parliament, was recently vacated by Hon. Muntaka Mohammed Mubarak (Ghana) following his nomination as a Minister.
Hon. Chief Fortune Zephania Charumbira, President of the Pan-African Parliament announced the appointment during a session of the Pan-African Parliament on Tuesday in Midrand, South Africa.
Kalu’s emergence followed his nomination by the West African Caucus, which the plenary of the parliament then approved before the announcement by Hon. Chief Fortune Charumbira.
The nomination was conveyed in a letter by the West African Caucus Chairman, Hon. Alhagie Mbow (the Gambia), which recognized his work at the Nigerian parliament, the ECOWAS parliament and the IPU where he is also leading a steering committee.
Chairman West African caucus in the nomination letter read on the floor of the parliament by President of PAP, Hon. Chief Fortune Charumbira said Rt. Hon. Ben Kalu who is the leader of the Nigerian Delegation to PAP “is the most qualified person for the job and has been unanimously endorsed by the regional Caucus to replicate his good works at the ECOWAS in PAP.
The impact of Kalu’s parliamentary work has been similarly recognised internationally by supranational bodies like the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament.
According to information available on its website, the Pan-African Parliament (PAP), also known as the African Parliament, is the legislative body of the African Union (AU). Established in March 2004, its primary goal is to ensure the full participation of African peoples and their grassroots organizations in governance and economic integration across the continent.
The PAP is composed of up to 275 members representing the 55 AU member states. Each member state can send up to five representatives, including at least one woman, who are selected by their national legislatures. The Parliament exercises oversight, advisory, and consultative powers, with the long-term aim of evolving into an institution with full legislative authority, elected through universal suffrage
The Rt. Hon. Kalu-led Monetary and Financial Affairs Committee has swung into action after his nomination with “consideration of the PAP 2026 proposed budget” listed on the order paper.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has denied being partisan in handling the failed recall of the Senator representing Kogi Central, Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan.
The Chief Press Secretary to the Chairman of INEC, Rotimi Oyekanmi, who was on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Thursday, explained how the Commission handled the process.
“In the case of the Kogi Central District, we received a petition and a cover letter and of course what Nigerians were saying was that we were taking sides,” Oyekanmi said on the programme.
“But what happened was that in the covering letter, the representatives of the petitioners did not include their address as required in our regulations and guidelines and what we just did was to ask them to supply their address, it has nothing to do with the petition.
“And of course, there is nowhere in the law where INEC is asked to reject a petition just because the cover letter did not contain the address. So, there was no hanky-panky in what we did.”
Earlier on Thursday, INEC rejected the petition to recall Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan, saying that it has not met the requirements.
The electoral commission said the petition to recall Senator Natasha did not meet constitutional requirements.
Senator Natasha was suspended for breaching Senate rules, prompting some of her constituents to initiate her recall. They claimed the move was to ensure their constituency did not lack representation following the suspension of the 45-year-old senator.
Asked whether there could be a repeat of the recall process, the INEC spokesperson said the law did not specify if the process could be repeated and how many times.
“The law just talks about the threshold, the threshold meaning that if you want to recall, you must have, in addition to your petition, 50 per cent plus one signatures. The law did not specify how many times you can undertake that,” he said.
The lawmaker has made headlines in recent months after she accused Senate President Godswill Akpabio of sexual harassment, a claim the Akwa Ibom lawmaker has equally denied.
She was thereafter suspended by the Red Chamber for violation of its rule of conduct.
The National Security Adviser, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, has handed over 19 kidnapped victims rescued by the security agencies to the Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Musa.
The brief ceremony took place on Thursday at the National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC), Office of the National Security Adviser in Abuja.
The victims included Ambassador Gideon Yohanna, the former Director-General of National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), Brigadier-General Maharazu Tsiga (retired) who had spent 56 days in captivity and 17 others, including a child.
Both Ribadu and Musa pledged to remain relentless until the criminals are wiped out and normalcy restored in the country.
“As a result of the work of our armed forces and other security services, we are able to rescue and bring back our own people,” he said.
“This time, it involves important personalities who served this country. We thank God for their lives, we are grateful to those who made it possible.
“This is an ongoing operation and we are doing it quite silently, we will go after the bad ones.”
Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan on Thursday applauded the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for rejecting a petition to recall her as the lawmaker representing Kogi Central Senatorial District.
The female lawmaker, who was a guest on Channels Television’s Politics Today, said the electoral umpire should have thrown out the petition long before it did on April 3, 2025.
“I’m a lawyer. I’m a senator and I understand how Nigeria works. For me, the most important thing is this recall process has been stalled.
“I give kudos and credit to INEC even though I believe they should have thrown it away from the get-go.
“I think it was void ab initio because there is no law in the Electoral Act that says a petition should be discarded just because there is no address but again, what if the address is false?”
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain argued that most of the addresses provided in the petition for her recall were false because most houses in her district weren’t labelled.
“Even though INEC did count 208,000 signatures, I bet you if they had gone into the verification stage, they would have struggled to even have 500 people come out to attest to signing that,” she added.
She accused Senate President Godswill Akpabio, Governor Usman Ododo and ex-governor Yahaya Bello of sponsoring her failed recall.
In a much-awaited statement on Thursday, INEC said the petition for the recall of the lawmaker did not met the requirement of Section 69(a) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended).
“Therefore, no further action shall be taken on the recall of the Senator,” INEC declared.