Constitutional Imperatives on Legislative Defection: The Case of Senator Abaribe

By Okoi Obono-Obla 

Constitutional Imperatives on Legislative Defection: The Case of Senator Abaribe-

Two weeks ago, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe was pointedly asked by the Senate President, after he declared on the floor of the Senate that he had cross-carpeted to the African Democratic Congress (ADC) from the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), the party that sponsored his election. The Senate President inquired whether he still belonged to APGA. Senator Abaribe responded that APGA had expelled him from the party.

The Senate President then gave him two weeks to produce the letter of expulsion from APGA, and Senator Abaribe promised to present it at the next sitting of the Senate.

However, APGA Abia State has requested the Senate to declare Abaribe’s seat vacant. According to Punch Newspaper (20 March 2026), the party made this call during a press briefing in Umuahia, where its leadership, led by former Abia State House of Assembly member Obinna Ichita, insisted that Abaribe voluntarily resigned from APGA and was not expelled, contrary to his claim in the Senate.

Ichita argued that Abaribe’s exit from the party that sponsored his election violates constitutional provisions, stressing that there was no leadership crisis within APGA to justify his defection. The party maintained that Senator Abaribe resigned voluntarily from his ward, which was his right. However, it emphasized that if a legislator leaves the party that provided the platform for election, without a leadership crisis at the national level, the seat must be declared vacant.

I agree with the position taken by the party. If a legislator resigns from the party that sponsored his election, he must lose his seat and vacate membership of the legislative house into which he was elected. In these circumstances, Senator Abaribe must vacate his seat in the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria forthwith, because there is no crisis at the national level of APGA to warrant his defection.

This is the purport of Section 68(1)(g) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), which provides:

> “A member of the Senate or of the House of Representatives shall vacate his seat in the House if—being a person whose election to the House was sponsored by a political party, he becomes a member of another political party before the expiration of the period for which that House was elected:
> Provided that this shall not apply where such a member’s membership of the political party is not a result of a division in the political party or of a merger of two or more political parties or factions by one of which he was previously sponsored.”

The Constitution is clear: a legislator is only entitled to defect if he can establish that there is a leadership crisis at the national level of the party that sponsored his election. Otherwise, defection mandates vacating the seat. In this case, Senator Abaribe claimed he was expelled from APGA, but the party has publicly debunked that assertion. Even assuming, without conceding, that he was expelled, such expulsion itself would be a ground for vacating his seat, since he cannot continue to cling to membership of a party that has formally severed ties with him.

Judicial Authority: Abegunde v. Labour Party
The Supreme Court of Nigeria in Abegunde v. Labour Party (2015) LPELR-24588(SC) reinforced this constitutional principle. The Court held that a legislator cannot defect from the political party that sponsored his election unless there is a division or leadership crisis at the national level of that party. The Court emphasized that mere disagreements or factional disputes at the state or ward level do not suffice. In Abegunde’s case, his defection was declared unconstitutional because there was no national crisis in the Labour Party, and he consequently lost his seat.

This precedent directly applies to Senator Abaribe’s situation. Since APGA has not experienced any division at the national level, his defection to ADC is unconstitutional. By the combined effect of Section 68(1)(g) and the Supreme Court’s pronouncement in Abegunde v. Labour Party, Senator Abaribe’s seat in the Senate must be declared vacant.

Conclusion
Senator Abaribe’s defection to ADC, absent a national leadership crisis in APGA, squarely falls within the constitutional prohibition against arbitrary defections. The Supreme Court has already settled this matter in Abegunde v. Labour Party, making it clear that his seat cannot be retained under such circumstances. Therefore, his continued occupation of the Senate seat is unconstitutional, and the Senate is duty-bound to declare it vacant.