Natasha Akpoti Uduaghan’s rough ride to senate is book on its own that has chapters, verses and every chapter is dotted with blood, torture as evidenced in the concerted efforts by Governor Yahaya Bello administration to snuff life out of the genuine political ambition of the lioness of the 10th Senate
By Miracle Egbo
In his closet, Senator Natasha Akpoti -Uduaghan would have reflected on her close shave with death no thanks to the plot to eliminate her and end her political ambition in the state. In 2018, she tried to be the governor of the state on the platform of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, but for the heat oozing from the camp of Governor Yahaya Bello and his goons in the state.
Senator Uduaghan got her baptism of fire during the peace accord for political parties in 2018 where thugs loyal to the governor of the state manhandled her, it took the intervention of the chairman of the peace accord, Major General Abdul salami Abubakar retd, to stave off the thugs from making the public see her nakedness. Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan left the venue of the supposedly peace accord with bruised political nose.
The incident of 2018 and its gory tales never scared her away from pursuing her dream of getting involved in politics to be able to bring dividends of democracy to her constituency. When history beckons on her again to come and prove her political mettle, she decided to go to the senate using the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. The temerity of Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan to throw her hart in the ring was said to have infuriated the camp of the governor who has a preferred candidate for the race in the person of Abubakar Ohere.
True to the determination of Governor Bello to stop Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan from realizing her dream of contributing her quota in the development of the state, unleashed allegedly his attack thugs on her. The state was so hot according to information that Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan was literally operating from Abuja in almost all her campaign tour of her Kogi East senatorial district.
The first frustration she got was that in a bid to stop her campaign, Governor Bello was said to have dug gullies in all the roads that lead to the campaign areas in her senatorial district in order to disorient her movement in the course of her campaign. Despite her outcry, the government of the state under the leadership of Governor Bello gave feeble reason why the big gullies were dug in all the roads leading to the senatorial district of Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan. The frustration created by the administration of Governor Bello served as a blood tonic to the determination of Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan to be more creative in her campaign, and that ingenuity paid off at the poll.
Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan dusted her opponent in the race with a wide margin at the poll despite the calculated effort of the electoral umpire to make sure that her votes were denied, and in some polling units her votes were subtracted. Worse still, in some polling units that she had upper hand, INEC decided not to count votes under one flimsy reason or the other, instead advancing undue advantage to her opponents at the polls who enjoyed the mandate of the electoral umpire for some time before the mandate of the people was upheld at the court.
Miffed by the decision of the electoral body to declare somebody who never won the election as the winner, Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan armed with the evidences at the polling units at the senatorial district, approached the State Election Petition Tribunal to upturn the mandate given to her opponent by the INEC. After listening to her plea and seeing the merit it exuded, the Tribunal in its unanimous judgment said that Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan was the duly elected senator for the Kogi East senatorial district not Senator Ohere.
Dissatisfied by the judgment of the Tribunal, Governor Bello prodded his sidekick to approach the Appeal Court with the mindset that he is going to pull all the political strings to make sure that the decision of the Tribunal is set aside. Governor Bello made good his threat of pulling political strings when he allegedly approached the First Lady of Nigeria, Senator Oluremi Tinubu to use her good offices to influence the judges, a request that was rejected Mrs. Tinubu who was said to have warned him to desist from such dangerous mission, adding that she is not happy that the number of women in the 10th National Assembly is low and not encouraging, therefore she is not going to be a party to deny a woman whom her people through the ballot paper had chosen to represent them at the senate.
At the wake of all the plots to thwart the mandate given to Senator Uduaghan, the Appeal Court sitting in Abuja upheld the decision of the Tribunal declaring her as the duly elected senator to represent Kogi East senatorial district in the 10th Senate.
Reacting to her victory at the Appeal Court, elated Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan assured her constituency that they are not going to regret giving her their mandate to represent them at the Senate. She said that her resolve is that she is going to use her position as a senator to impact positively on the lives of the people of her constituency. She used the occasion to thank her party PDP for its unalloyed support throughout her trials, promising her party that she is going to be a good ambassador of the party in the Senate.
It was gathered that it is not yet Uhuru for the Senator whose courage and determination is out of this world as thugs allegedly loyal to the governor were said to have attacked her immediately after her inauguration as Senator on the floor of the Senate on her way home. Her attackers are still at large as at the time of filing this report. The bewildered supporters of the newest Senator are still insisting that even after she had defeated her opponents at the Appeal Court, they are still after her life.
