There is something profoundly unsettling about the speed with which the House of Representatives of Nigeria has moved on the Electoral Act amendment criminalising dual party membership. On the 11th of March 2026, in a single sitting, a bill with far-reaching implications for political participation and democratic freedoms was rushed through First, Second, and Third Readings and passed without the kind of scrutiny that even far less consequential legislation typically receives. This is not efficiency; it is cherry picking. And it demands resistance from the Senate of Nigeria.
What makes this even more troubling is not just the content of the bill, but the contrast it exposes. The same 10th National Assembly that suddenly discovered legislative urgency has, for months and in some cases years, dragged its feet on bills that positively affect the socio-economic wellbeing of Nigerians. Critical amendments to the Universal Basic Education Commission Act, which seek to expand funding and strengthen Nigeria’s failing basic education system, remain stalled in committee stages. Efforts to improve the National Health Act (HB533, HB802, & HB1284), particularly amendments aimed at increasing funding for primary healthcare and making services more accessible, have similarly languished without priority or urgency.
Data from the National Assembly’s own Legislative Progression Dashboard reinforces this troubling pattern. As at 31st March 2026, education and health legislation together account for some of the largest workloads in the current Assembly, yet their progression rates remain modest. For instance, the health sector alone has recorded over 150 proposed bills, with about 68 referred to committees and only around 24 committee reports laid, reflecting a throughput rate of roughly 35 percent. Education bills show a similar pattern: dozens have been introduced, with many seeking to expand Nigeria’s higher education system through the establishment of new universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education, but only a limited number advance beyond committee scrutiny to the reporting stage. More broadly, the dashboard reveals that the committee stage has become the single largest bottleneck in the legislative process both in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Out of roughly 835 bills introduced in the 10th Senate, about 412 remain stuck in committees awaiting review and reporting. In other words, nearly half of all legislative proposals are effectively trapped at this point in the process. Committee scrutiny is an essential safeguard in lawmaking, but the scale of this backlog raises legitimate questions about the lack of political will, legislative capacity and priorities—particularly when bills addressing education, healthcare, and other pressing public needs remain stalled while politically sensitive legislation can suddenly move through the chambers with immense alacrity.
Here is the real story. When it comes to education for millions of out-of-school children, and much needed reform in the Police force, the legislature slows to a crawl. More so, when it comes to healthcare access for vulnerable Nigerians and constitutional amendments for gender inclusion, deliberation becomes endless. But when it comes to regulating political actors and passing a bill that can be interpreted as controlling internal party dynamics and potentially dissent, the process becomes miraculously swift.
The divergence becomes even more obvious when one examines reforms that genuinely aim to strengthen democratic participation and electoral accountability. Consider the long-standing proposal to establish an Electoral Offences Commission which can prosecute and adjudicate on electoral matters, an institutional reform repeatedly recommended by observers and other stakeholders to ensure that electoral crimes are properly investigated and prosecuted. In the 10th National Assembly, an initial Electoral Offences Commission (Establishment) Bill, HB 923, sponsored by Honourable Kingsley Chinda, was introduced for First Reading on 16 November 2023 but has remained stalled at that very stage since its introduction. A separate bill pursuing the same objective, sponsored by Honourable Jamo Aminu, HB 1219, was introduced on 18 May 2024, and while the committee report was eventually laid before the whole House on 23 July 2024, there has been no legislative movement since then. The slow progress of these proposals stands in stark contrast to the urgency displayed in advancing the amendment criminalising dual party membership. This juxtaposition is difficult to ignore: legislation that could strengthen electoral integrity, improve accountability, and deepen democratic participation struggles to move forward, while a bill designed to regulate and punish political actors advanced rapidly through the legislative process. The disparity reinforces a valid concern that the machinery of lawmaking suddenly moves with remarkable speed with issues of political nature. The inconsistency is not just blatant; it is dangerous, and It sends a clear message about what and who matters in Nigeria’s legislative priorities. It suggests that the process of lawmaking can be accelerated when political interests are at stake, but stalls conveniently when ordinary Nigerians stand to benefit.
The justification for this amendment rings hollow when placed against this backdrop. Nigeria’s democratic challenges are not rooted in the absence of punitive legislation but rather in the persistent weakness of institutions responsible for enforcing the rules that already exist. The aftermath of the 2023 general elections illustrates this clearly. Despite numerous documented incidents of vote-buying, ballot box snatching, and voter intimidation reported by domestic and international observers, very few offenders have been successfully prosecuted. Similarly, Nigeria’s Constitution already contains provisions regulating political defections by elected officials, particularly Sections 68 and 109 which require legislators to vacate their seats if they defect from the party under which they were elected, except under limited circumstances. Yet in practice, defections across party lines frequently occur with little institutional enforcement or consequence. These examples highlight the deeper institutional deficit at the heart of Nigeria’s democratic challenges: the country does not lack laws governing political conduct; it lacks the consistent enforcement mechanisms needed to ensure that those laws are applied. In such an environment, creating new criminal penalties without strengthening enforcement institutions risks adding more statutes to a system that already struggles to implement the rules on its books. Passing a law that prescribes a ₦10,000,000 fine or imprisonment without addressing these deeper issues is not reform, it is a mere distraction.
Even more concerning is the precedent being set. Laws that touch on political rights and participation should be subjected to the highest level of scrutiny, consultation with all stakeholders, and debate. Instead, what Nigerians witnessed was a legislative sprint, devoid of transparency and public engagement. It raises legitimate concerns about motive, about timing, and about who ultimately stands to benefit from such a hurried process.
The Senate must not become a conveyor belt for this kind of lawmaking. It must recognize that its role is not to validate the speed of the House, but to question it. It must ask why bills that could improve classrooms, fund healthcare, and ease the daily struggles of Nigerians are left to gather dust, while a politically sensitive amendment is fast-tracked with unprecedented urgency.
To pass this bill in its current form and manner would be to endorse not just its content, but the troubling legislative culture it represents, a culture where priorities are inverted, where urgency is selective, and where the needs of the people are secondary to the interests of the political class.
Nigeria deserves better than performative lawmaking. It deserves a legislature that treats education, healthcare, and economic wellbeing with the same urgency it has just displayed. Until that happens, the Senate must do the only responsible thing, halt this amendment and force a reckoning with the real priorities of governance.