Senator’s sexual harassment support Roil Nigeria

By Egbejule in Abidjan

Last July, the third most powerful man in Nigeria rarely gave excuses on the floor of the Senate who heads.

Godswill Akpabio had chastised his colleague Natasha Akpoti-Auduaghan for talking out of turn, saying: “We are not in a night club”. But after receiving what he said he was a flood of offensive text messages from the Nigerians, he publicly apologized a few days later.

In the last few weeks, the two have been at the center of a political row that grabbed the country, after an interview that Akpoti-Auduaghan gave to the broadcaster on TV at the end of February in which he accused Akpabio of sexual harassment.

He said that in an accident, Akpabio had told her that a motion that was trying to advance could be put to the Senate if “he took care of him”. In another, he said that during a tour of his home he had told her – while he held her hand – “I will create time to come and spend moments of quality here. You will like it. “

Akpabio denied the accusations.

Akpoti-Auduaghan presented a petition to the Senate regarding sexual harassment, but on March 6 the ethical committee hit him for procedural reasons. She also handed her a suspension of six months without remuneration, citing her “rebellious and disruptive” behavior during a discussion not related to the Senate on the seats agreements.

The accusations dominated the conversations and highlighted the issues relating to women’s rights in the socially conservative country, in which no woman has ever been elected governor, vice -president or president.

Only four women serve in the Senate of 109 members, a drop in the seven senators elected women elected in 2015. The number of women in the Chamber of representatives of 360 members also decreased, from 22 in 2015 to 17.

In a telephone interview from New York last week, hours before speaking in a joint session of the Interparent Union and of the United Nations women, Akpoti-Unduaghan blocked himself against his suspension.

“This was orchestrated to silence my voice,” he said. “That action is an assault on democracy … I’m not apologizing for having said my truth.”

The groups for women’s rights condemned his suspension and hundreds of women and girls marched in the states of Lagos, Enugu, Edo and Kaduna Wednesday during a protest “We all Natasha” convened by the coalition of civil society Womanifesto.

“His suspension and the process that brought him were a Shambolic shame show,” said Ireti Bakare-Yusuf, radio station and founder of the Foundation for non-profitless purple women, who is part of Womanifesto.

Ahmed Tijani Ibn Mustapha, spokesman for Akpabio, said that the Akpoti-Auduaghan petition claiming that sexual harassment had not followed the guidelines because he had written and signed by himself rather than asking another senator to do it.

He also said that after reciting the petition correctly, the Senate started a four -week survey on the statements.

Akpoti-Auduaghan, a Senator of the Democratic Party People (PDP) of the opposition of the central state of Kogi, tried for the first time to enter politics in 2019 with a race for the governor of Kogi. According to reports, the criminals faithful to the sentence of all the progressives of the Congress (APC) derived it during the countryside, calling her a prostitute and on one occasion attacking her and her driver. “This is certainly not an election,” he told journalists at that moment. “This is almost like a war zone.”

Four years later, on the eve of the senate elections that was contesting, parts of the main roads that led to his district were dug overnight. He accused the APC of trying to prevent her from doing a campaign. The authorities declared to protect residents from terrorist attacks, citing a bomb explosion of December 2022 by a affiliate of the Islamic State.

He lost his elections, but in November 2023 a court canceled the results, opening the way to her to become one of the youngest senators of Nigeria.

Akpabio, a political veteran, was the subject of another accusation of sexual harassment by a former public official in 2020. At the time he denied the accusation and recently said he would sue his accuser. Previously he had made news in 2018 when he had foreseen an electoral victory for his APC party by making comparisons with the invasion of Hitler in Poland. Last year, shortly after becoming president of the Senate, he was involved in another controversy when a senator was suspended for saying that there were inconsistencies in the budget.

After the suspension of Akpoti-Auduaghan, other senators joined Akpabio, a powerful ally of the president of the country, Bola Tinubu.

A male senator said that Akpoti-Auduaghan built the statements because he was angry for his removal as president of a ambient commission of the Senate in February. The current senators rejected his claims on national TV, while a former senator said that Akpoti-Auduaghan’s statements were “a sign of weakness” and that sexual harassment occurred only in schools.

“The male senators don’t surprise me,” Bakare-Yusuf of the reaction said. “Even the base of black and white even measures to justify their selfishness. As for senators, disappointed is an euphemism [but] Like all hegemonic structures, Patriarchate also has guardians. “

In the aftermath of his accusation, a false statement that Akpoti-Auduaghan had brought six children from six different men that emerged on social media. The Senate spokesman said that a kiss he shared with his husband in the senate premises before presenting his petition was “unspeakable” and an act of “content creation”. In the last two weeks, the crowd of pro-akpabio demonstrators showed up in public to abuse it in Abuja.

“The politicians have lined up with the president of the Senate who believe he has the power to grant them favors … and the poor were paid by those who have more money to protest,” said Glory Heyremen, senior analyst at the geopolitical risk consultancy based in Lagos, SBM Intelligence.

Some opposition senators visited Akpoti-Auduaghan to show support. He also said he had received and -up -ons women throughout Nigeria, including some who were afraid of talking about their experiences. “In Nigeria, most women who are sexually harassed in the workplace do not even say to their husbands because they are afraid of being judged,” he said.

As the episode takes place, more women praise his courage, but few think that the time #metoo of Nigeria has arrived.

Heyremen said that a culture rooted in impunity was a barrier to justice. “The Nigerian elite cannot obtain justice if they do not have alliances with the” powerful “,” he said. “It doesn’t matter the normal Nigerian.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/16/senator-sexual- Harassment-claims Nigeriana-nigeria-hapoti-udughan

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