{"id":62164,"date":"2025-03-05T12:54:43","date_gmt":"2025-03-05T12:54:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=62164"},"modified":"2025-03-05T12:54:43","modified_gmt":"2025-03-05T12:54:43","slug":"court-halts-senate-probe-of-natasha-akpoti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/03\/05\/court-halts-senate-probe-of-natasha-akpoti\/","title":{"rendered":"Court Halts Senate Probe of Natasha Akpoti"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Patrick Idowu<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Federal High Court in Abuja has restrained the Senate from proceeding with its disciplinary review of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, dealing a blow to the upper chamber\u2019s efforts to punish her alleged misconduct.<\/p>\n<p>Justice Obiora Egwuatu issued the order following an ex parte application filed by Akpoti-Uduaghan\u2019s legal team.<\/p>\n<p>The ruling blocks the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges, and Public Petitions from investigating the Kogi Central senator, at least for now.<\/p>\n<p>The Senate had last week referred Akpoti-Uduaghan to the committee over what it called \u201cdisorderly conduct\u201d during a heated plenary session.<\/p>\n<p>The committee, led by Senator Neda Imaseun (LP, Edo), was given two weeks to submit its findings.<\/p>\n<p>The resolution followed a motion by Senate spokesperson Yemi Adaramodu, who accused Akpoti-Uduaghan of \u201cextreme intransigence\u201d and turning the chamber into a spectacle.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Senate is not a platform for content creation but for lawmaking and oversight,\u201d Adaramodu said, calling for discipline. \u201cWhere there is sin, there must be penalty.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele also defended the probe, saying the Senate\u2019s integrity was at stake.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe will not allow this institution to be discredited beyond what we inherited,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the court order, Senate President Godswill Akpabio had earlier justified the disciplinary move, suggesting Akpoti-Uduaghan\u2019s actions stemmed from unfamiliarity with Senate procedures.<\/p>\n<p>With the court\u2019s intervention, the Senate now faces a dilemma: challenge the ruling or back down from its attempt to discipline the outspoken senator.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Patrick Idowu The Federal High Court in Abuja has restrained the Senate from proceeding with its disciplinary review of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, dealing a blow to the upper chamber\u2019s efforts to punish her alleged misconduct. Justice Obiora Egwuatu issued the order following an ex parte application filed by Akpoti-Uduaghan\u2019s legal team. The ruling blocks [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":62165,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[172],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-62164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-featured"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62164"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62164\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62166,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62164\/revisions\/62166"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}