Midterm: Senate spokesperson disagrees with Bamidele, insists chamber passed 844 bills

The Spokesperson of the Nigerian Senate, Yemi Adaramodu, has clarified that 844 bills were introduced in the upper chamber within the last two years.

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However, he declined to specify how many of those bills were passed within the period.

Mr Adaramodu, the Ekiti South Senatorial District senator, made the disclosure during a press briefing at the National Assembly on Tuesday, where he addressed criticisms surrounding the Senate’s midterm legislative performance.

“We have done a lot within two years of our inauguration. It will interest us that within two years, more than any other session, the 10th Senate had considered exactly 844 bills within 25 months,” he said.

The Senate spokesperson noted that President Bola Tinubu has assented to 55 bills since the inauguration of the 10th National Assembly.

Despite acknowledging that 55 of those bills have been assented to by the president, Mr Adaramodu was silent on the exact number of bills passed by the Senate during the period.

“52 had recently…three were added just today and had become laws which are no more bills. They have been assented to by the presidency,” he added.

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Providing further insight into the status of pending bills, the senator revealed that 107 bills are currently awaiting public hearings, 400 are at the crucible of the second reading, and 200 have scaled first reading.

“We have 107 now outside the second reading, which will go to public hearing. We have 400 as of now under the crucible of the second hearing, and we have 200 that have just scaled the first hearing,” he added.

Conflicting data from Senate leadership

The Senate spokesperson’s comments come amid public backlash over discrepancies in figures provided by the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, and the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, on the number of bills passed since the 10th National Assembly was inaugurated in June 2023.

During a joint session of the National Assembly to mark Democracy Day on Thursday, Mr Akpabio announced that 96 out of 844 bills had been passed within the two years.

Contradicting him, Mr Bamidele, in a statement released on Sunday to commemorate the Senate’s midterm performance, said the chamber passed 108 out of 983 bills.

The discrepancies generated criticism from the public, with many Nigerians questioning the credibility and consistency of the Senate’s internal record-keeping.

Some critics argued that the conflicting figures reflect the opacity and disorganisation within Nigeria’s legislative process.

Oversight and petitions

Mr Adaramodu spoke on other legislative duties beyond lawmaking, particularly oversight and public petitions. However, he was equally vague about the exact number of petitions handled by the Senate.

READ ALSO: Midterm: Confusion at Nigerian Senate as Akpabio, Bamidele contradict themselves on number of bills passed

“During that period, we have dealt with a lot of public petitions and you know what we mean by public petition, Nigerians may be those who have been wronged either by the system or by individuals or by institutions of government or institutions that are private, so we have dealt with over 100,” he said.

He added that the Senate has also carried out oversight responsibilities across different sectors, including power, security, and the economy. However, he provided no further breakdown or measurable outcomes of these functions.

“And then, we have done oversight functions, we have dealt with issues of national interest, power matters, security matters, economic matters,” Mr Adaramodu stated.