Godswill Akpabio has been the 15th president of the Nigerian Senate since 2023. In 2015, he was elected as the first senator for the Akwa Ibom North-West senate District. He lost the 2019 senate election but won the 2023 one. From 2019 until 2022, he also held the position of Minister for Niger Delta Affairs until stepping down to run for reelection to the Nigerian Senate. Prior to that, he was Akwa Ibom State’s governor from 2007 until 2015.
Godswill Akpabio is the son of Madam Lucy Obot Akpabio (née Inyangetor) and Chief Obot Akpabio of Ukana, Ikot Ntuen, in the Essien Udim Local Government Area. On December 9, 1962, he was born. He was reared by his mother after losing his father while he was a young child. Education Akpabio received his education at the Federal Government College in Port Harcourt, Rivers State; Methodist Primary School in Ukana, Essien Udim LGA, Akwa Ibom State; and the University of Calabar in Cross River State, where he earned a law degree.
Before becoming an associate partner at Paul Usoro and Co., a well-known Nigerian law firm, Akpabio had a brief stint as a teacher. Later, he was employed by Lagos, Nigeria-based EMIS Telecoms Limited, a wireless telecommunications provider. He rose to the position of Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director by 2002. Before this, he was a director of EMIS and the National Publicity Secretary of the Association of Telecommunication Companies in Nigeria (ATCOM).
Then Governor Obong Victor Attah of Akwa Ibom State appointed him the Honourable Commissioner for Petroleum and Natural Resources in 2002. He was a Commissioner in three important ministries from 2002 to 2006: Lands and Housing, Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, and Petroleum and Natural Resources. He ran in a contentious primary election in 2006 to become the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) nominee for governor of Akwa Ibom State, defeating 57 other candidates. His “let God’s will be done” campaign garnered widespread support, and he was elected governor in 2007. In 2011, he was elected Governor of Akwa Ibom State for a second term.
He was chosen to chair the newly established PDP Governors Forum in 2013. He ran for and was elected to the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2015, representing the Akwa Ibom North-West Senatorial District (Ikot Ekpene). He defeated Chief Inibehe Okorie of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who received 15,152 votes to be proclaimed elected by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), with 422,009 of 439,449 votes while running on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
President Muhammadu Buhari nominated him for a ministerial job in July 2019, and the Nigerian Senate vetted his application. He took the oath of office as Minister for Niger Delta Affairs on August 21, 2019. In order to run in the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential primary, Akpabio resigned his post as minister of Niger Delta affairs in June 2022.
