Eight senators (7.3%) and thirteen members of the House of Representatives (3.6%), or 4.5% of the total Assembly, were female in the 9th National Assembly. Only four of Nigeria’s 108 elected senators—aside from the late Senator Ifeanyi Ubah—are female, with the other 104 being men.CONTINUE FULL READING>>>>>
Approximately 4% of the 10th Senate is made up of female senators. The egregious underrepresentation of women in parliament has been bemoaned by political observers. Eight senators (7.3%) and thirteen members of the House of Representatives (3.6%), or 4.5% of the total Assembly, were female in the 9th National Assembly.
After seven general election cycles since 1999, the number of women in the Senate has been underrepresented in the 10th Assembly, with women holding four out of 109 Senate seats (2.7%) and 17 out of 360 House of Representatives seats (4.7%), or 4.2% of the 469-member Assembly.
Here is a complete list of all the female senators serving in the 10th Senate: Ireti Heebah Kingibe (Senator, FCT, LP) Kingibe was elected on the platform of the Labour Party (LP) to represent the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). She received her Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Civil Engineering from the University of Minnesota in the 1970s.
Ajoke Mohammed, the wife of former Head of State Murtala Mohammed, is her younger sister. She first ran for the FCT senatorial seat in 2003 under the now-defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP). In 2014, she joined the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and then the All Progressives Congress (APC).
She was born on June 2, 1954, and was married to Babagana Kingibe, a former Secretary-General of the Federation (SGF). Ipalibo Banigo, a senator from Rivers West who represented the PDP, was the first female Rivers Deputy Governor from 2015 to 2023 during Nyesom Wike’s administration.
She earned her MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery) degree while attending the University College Hospital in Ibadan, Oyo State. She graduated from Harvard University School of Public Health with a Master of Science (M.Sc.). During her tenure at the Rivers State Ministry of Health, she held a number of significant positions, including director of the public health service, acting commissioner, director, and permanent secretary.
Lagos West, APC Senator Idiat Oluranti Adebule Adebule was the Lagos Deputy Governor from 2015 to 2019 while representing Lagos West on behalf of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Educationist Adebule graduated with a doctorate in curriculum studies from Lagos State University. Early in her career, she had worked as a junior lecturer at the Michael Otedola College of Primary Education in Lagos and Lagos State University.
She also held the position of Commissioner at the Teachers’ Establishment and Pensions Office, formerly known as the Lagos State Post Primary Teaching Service Commission (PP-TESCOM). In July 2011, she was sworn in as the State Government’s Secretary under former Governor Raji Fashola. Senator Kogi Central’s Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan She is a politician and lawyer who has served since 2023 as a representative of Kogi Central Senatorial District in the 10th Nigeria National Assembly.
After graduating from the University of Abuja (2000–2004) with a Bachelor of Laws, Akpoti, who was born to a Nigerian father and a Ukrainian mother, went on to the Nigerian Law School and was admitted to the Nigerian bar in 2005. She then earned an MBA in Oil and Gas Management from the University of Dundee in 2011 before entering politics and running for senate in the 2019 Kogi State gubernatorial election under the Social Democratic Party. She also founded the Builders Hub Impact Investment Program (BHIIP).
Akpoti-Uduaghan accused Senate President Godswill Akpabio of sexual assault on Arise News in February 2025. The Senate President’s ethics committee dismissed her claims after she made them, pointing to infractions of procedural rules, and suggested that she be suspended. She was therefore placed on six-month suspension on March 6, 2025, during which she will not be allowed to return to her office and her security and allowances will be taken away. Akpoti-Uduaghan has sued the Senate President, claiming damages of ₦100 billion.CONTINUE FULL READING>>>>>
