The Speaker as a Herald: How Edo’s Power of the Purse Got Turned Upside Down by Lawson Akhigbe

There is a short, seemingly unremarkable video clip circulating online that captures everything currently wrong with state-level governance in Nigeria.

In the clip, the Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Blessing Agbebaku, stands surrounded by constituents, speaking eagerly into a microphone. He is listing out a grand roll-call of road projects from Irekpen to Ozalla, Sabongida-Ora to Uzebba, and down to Otuo.

On the surface, it sounds like great news for infrastructure. But listen closely to the phrasing: “The Governor has told me that he’s going to construct so many roads… The Governor has even approved the construction… Another road that the Governor has said he will also do…”

Notice what is conspicuously missing from the Speaker’s speech? Budgetary appropriation.

Not once does the head of the legislative branch mention the House of Assembly’s statutory role in scrutinizing, debating, or passing an Appropriation Act for these multi-billion Naira projects. There is no mention of legislative authorization, supplementary budgets, or committee oversight.

Instead, the constitutional custodian of the state’s purse speaks like a civil servant relaying executive directives from his principal.

When did the head of an independent arm of government become a spokesperson for the Executive?

The Constitutional and Legal Inversion

Under Section 120 and Section 121 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the principle of Separation of Powers is explicit:

1. No expenditure without appropriation: No money shall be withdrawn from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the State except to meet expenditure that is charged upon the Fund by the Constitution, or where the issuance of those funds has been authorized by an Appropriation Law enacted by the House of Assembly.
2. The Executive proposes, the Legislature disposes: The Governor presents the estimates of revenue and expenditure to the Assembly, but it is the Parliament that authorizes the spending.
   

What this clip demonstrates is a complete constitutional inversion. The Executive branch decides where the funds go, unilaterally awards multi-billion Naira projects, and the head of the legislature passively broadcasts those decisions to the public as a fait accompli, long before any legitimate legislative oversight or public appropriation hearings take place.
The supervisor has become the messenger.

Unilateral Governance: The Ikpoba Hill Flyover Template

This clip is not an isolated slip of the tongue; it reflects a broader culture of unilateral executive spending in the state.
Take the flagship Ikpoba Hill (Ramat Park) flyover project as a prime example. Capital expenditures of such massive financial magnitude are announced and flagged off directly by the executive branch often during periods when the House of Assembly isn’t even sitting, and with no public record or verifiable proof of prior legislative debate or legislative appropriation authorizing those specific capital commitments.

When major urban projects are unilaterally rolled out and millions are committed without open parliamentary authorization, the constitutional function of the legislature is reduced to a rubber stamp. The House of Assembly is brought in after the fact if at all to legalize spending that has already been spent or committed, rendering budget defense hearings a meaningless exercise in political theater.

Lessons from the Second Republic: Alegbe vs. Alli

To appreciate the gravity of this institutional decline, one only needs to look back to the Second Republic in old Bendel State.

When Professor Ambrose Alli was Governor, the Speaker of the House of Assembly was Rt. Hon. Benson Alegbe. Alli was a visionary leader, but Alegbe understood his constitutional mandate as the leader of a co-equal arm of government.

Governor Alli did not simply “tell” Speaker Alegbe what projects he had unilaterally decided to construct. The Executive submitted its development plans to the House, where lawmakers vigorously debated, scrutinized, modified, and approved or rejected line items based on their independent constitutional authority.

Alegbe didn’t view legislative oversight as hostility toward the Governor; he understood it as his sworn duty to protect the constitutional integrity of the state and safeguard the public purse.

When the NPN Federal government of President Shehu Shagari wanted to build low costs housing in Bendel state, the UPN government of the state rejected it and sought to build its own instead, there were long delays in the Alegbe led House of Assembly to investigate the financial efficacy of such a project. In a comedy BDTV program satirised the process by claiming the delay was caused by Benson Alegbe’s insistence that a road project within the housing estate be named Alegbe way and not Alegbe close.

The state government of Prof Ambrose Alli built low-cost housing estates in Ugbowo, Ikpoba Hill in Benin City, and Bendel Estates in Warri  in today’s Delta State following legislative oversight by the Benson Alegbe led Bendel State House of Assembly.

Why This Matters for Democracy

When a Speaker functions as an executive herald and major capital expenditures bypass legislative scrutiny, checks and balances collapse completely.

Infrastructure like the roads in Owan West and the Ikpoba Hill flyover are undeniably important for economic activity and easing traffic. But how development is funded and authorized matters just as much as the development itself. When executive convenience replaces constitutional process, state governance quietly transitions from a constitutional democracy into an executive monarchy.

It is time for state assemblies across Nigeria to reclaim their constitutional weight. The Speaker of a State Assembly is not a project manager for the Governor’s office. He is the head of an independent arm of government, and it is high time our lawmakers started acting like it.

The Ikpoba Hill flyover project breached the Environmental Impact Assessment Act as no impact assessment was ever produced and we shall witness in real time how this failure will impact both the people and the environment in due course.