Senate State Police Amendment Accelerates as Plenary Enters Decisive Phase

The Nigerian Senate entered what lawmakers described as a decisive plenary phase on the state police constitutional amendment this week, with Senate President Godswill Akpabio pledging that the upper chamber would fast-track the remaining legislative stages to meet the commitment of completing the amendment before the end of 2026.

Senior lawmakers said the constitutional review committee had consolidated public submissions and stakeholder input from across the country’s geopolitical zones and was preparing its final report for presentation to the full Senate. The report would recommend specific constitutional provisions to be amended, the safeguards to be built into the enabling legislation, and the timeline for state ratification.

Chief of Staff to the President Femi Gbajabiamila, who has been coordinating the executive-legislative interface on the state police bill, confirmed in a statement that the President remained fully committed to the reform and would give it his active support through the remaining stages of the constitutional process.

Broad Consensus Holds Despite Warnings

Political analysts described the state police amendment as one of the few genuinely bipartisan issues in the current National Assembly, with virtually no party publicly opposing the principle of decentralised policing. The combination of worsening insecurity, the Oyo school abductions, bandit attacks in Kwara and Niger States, and the kidnapping crisis in the FCT had dramatically strengthened the case for communities having police forces with local knowledge and accountability.

However, Femi Falana offered a dissenting perspective at the Democracy Day commemoration lecture, arguing against state police creation without first fixing the governance failures in the existing federal police structure. He said politicians were interested in creating new agencies without funding them to work, pointing out that the governors already had constitutional responsibilities for policing through the Nigerian Police Council that they had consistently neglected. Falana’s warning was noted by legal analysts as a substantive caution rather than mere opposition.

Furthermore, groups including Miyetti Allah and Afenifere continued to press for strong constitutional safeguards against the misuse of state police by governors against political opponents or ethnic communities. The constitutional review committee said it had taken these concerns seriously and would include clear provisions addressing command structures, accountability mechanisms, and citizens’ rights protections. Notably, Akpabio used the June 12 commemoration lecture to call on Nigerians to pray for the exposure of those sponsoring terrorism, signalling that the Security dimension of the state police debate would remain front and centre in Senate proceedings. Consequently, the state police amendment is on track to be the most consequential piece of legislation passed by the Tinubu-era National Assembly, with implications for every corner of Nigeria’s governance landscape for decades to come.

National Assembly Probes Lagos Airport Fire

In addition, the Joint Aviation Committee of the National Assembly this week completed its inspection of damage sustained by infrastructure at Lagos Airport following a fire incident earlier in the year. Committee members said their findings would form the basis of recommendations to the federal government on urgent repairs and the development of a more robust fire prevention and emergency response framework for all Nigerian airports. As a result, aviation safety has emerged as an additional legislative priority alongside the security and electoral reform agenda.