By Owei Lakemfa
Senate President Godswill Akpabio issued a very powerful statement to the world on October 11, 2025, titled, “The Trials and Triumphs of a Resilient Nigeria’s 10th Senate.” He vowed that: “The Senate cannot and will not be held hostage by the disruptive instincts of any of its members.”
He declared: “Democracy thrives only when its institutions are respected and its rules upheld…The discipline of parliamentary conduct is a universal marker of political civilization.” The Senate President mentioned no names, gave no instances, referred to nothing. It was just a bland statement that said nothing. It gives the impression of an idle leader finding it difficult to get out of bed.
In any case, if the Senate is a productive body as Akpabio claims, it will be obvious from its acts and conduct, not empty declarations. If it were a disciplined body, it would have taken action against Acting Clerk Yahaya Danzaria, who after the expiration of the Senate’s six-month suspension of Senator Nathasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, wrote to extend the suspension without Senate approval.
Maybe Senator Akpabio, a lawyer, has been reading William Shakespeare and decided to issue a statement full of “sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
I admit Akpabio has been far less entertaining than the Minister of Works, ‘Professor’ David Umahi. A news anchor, Rufai Oseni, had in an interview asked Umahi for the cost breakdown of the on-going Lagos-Calabar Highway. The Minister, either because he does not know, or is an artful dodger, pretended to be angry: “These are elementary questions. And it makes no sense. A process is ongoing, payment has been made, and you are saying, ‘how has this money been utilized?’ The money is meant for the project, and it will be paid according to the work done.”
Then he purported to lecture the journalist and the public: “When a certificate is generated, and it is approved through a process in the Ministry of Works, it will then be given to the funders, who will, in turn, check if the works were done. How can you be asking for cost per kilometre? The prices are different. The next kilometre is different from the next kilometre.” This was quiet a ridiculous answer; that every kilometre of a 700-kilometre highway will have a different cost.
After Umahi’s rigmarole, the anchor insisted on a straight forward answer: What is the average cost per kilometre? Umahi decided to be rough. He told the interviewer: “Keep quiet and stop saying what you don’t know. I’m a professor in this field. You don’t understand anything. You have no knowledge of what you ask.”
Despite his claims, the truth is that the Minister is no professor in any field and does not appear to be capable of professing on any verifiable issue. Clearly, to him and his fellow collaborators, this highway project is a bottomless pit into which the country’s resources are being sunk with no way of verifying the actual cost.
So, why is a simple road project being presented by a Minister in Nigeria as a religion into which no enquiries can be made, and no questions can be asked without risking a charge of heresy?
Later, the Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde, weighed in: “They asked a Minister how much the coastal road is, and then you (Umahi) are dancing around and going to say that no, the next kilometre is different from the next kilometre. Then what is the average cost?”
Makinde then gave a template Umahi could use to answer this simple question: “When we did the Oyo to Iseyin road then, it was about N9.99 billion, almost N10 billion. About 34 or 35 kilometres, average cost is about N238 million per kilometre. But when we did Iseyin to Ogbomoso, that was 76 kilometres, it was about N43 billion, average cost is about N500 million per kilometre. And we had two bridges, one over the Ogun River and then one at Ogbomoso end.”
The Makinde logic is: if state governments could provide basic figures for projects, why can’t the Federal Government?
Once again, Minister Umahi who apparently loves the sound of his own voice, started booming: “If a governor that is far my junior in engineering and governance insults me, I will talk back. One thing I’m very good at is Mathematics. I’m an ‘A’ student in mathematics.”
Then, Minister Umahi tried to answer the elementary question of cost: “This controversy about cost per kilometre, I have told you that this project is about 43 kilometres. But we have increased it to utilize the money given for the project by the last administration, which was N73 billion. We have increased it to about 45 kilometers. “If we are doing surface tracing on the shoulder, the cost will be different. If we are using asphalt on the shoulder, the cost will be different. If we are using concrete as we are using, the cost will be different.
“It is being mischievous when you ask for the cost of a length of road; but by the professorial information, you can ask for cost per kilometer; could be divided to sections. “First, estimated cost, and estimated cost of this project, you can divide N73 billion over 45 kilometers,. That is the estimated cost. This cost has the element of contingency. “When you have finished this project – and of course, you can see that in this project, there are places you are using the existing median and there are places you will construct new median – will the cost be the same? It is not possible.”
In summary, the Honourable Minister who claims he is a professor, could not provide an answer.
Then in his trade mark fashion of diverting attention and being presumptuous, Umahi added: “I am his senior in governance and his senior in engineering practice. And so anything he doesn’t understand, he should call me and ask and I will not join issue because I have respect for our governors.
“I have respect for him as my friend and brother, but he should withdraw the word that I am dancing around. I never danced around and if he insists, he should come for debate.”
So, what should we as Nigerians, whose resources are being frittered away, do about this specific case? Send a high school child to help the Minister make basic calculations so we know the average cost of the road construction?
Petition President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to remove Umahi as Minister? On the other hand, should we go to court and restrain Minister Umahi and the Federal Government from continuing with this project or paying any money thereof, until we are provided the details, and the project is subjected to basic procedural rules of competitive bidding, budgetary provisions and adequate supervision?
