By Habeeb Ibrahim
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Vice-President Kashim Shettima and Senate President Godswill Akpabio are currently outside Nigeria, raising questions over who formally exercises presidential powers while the country’s three highest political officeholders are away.
Tinubu has been outside the country since August 30, when he travelled to London before moving to Paris, France, for what the Presidency described as a working vacation.
The Presidency announced on September 21 that Tinubu had extended his stay by a few days and would return to Nigeria at the weekend. As of September 25, there had been no official announcement confirming his return.
Shettima, meanwhile, travelled to New York on September 20 to represent Tinubu at the 81st United Nations General Assembly.
The Federal Ministry of Information and National Orientation confirmed that the Vice-President was leading Nigeria’s delegation and delivered Nigeria’s national statement at the UN General Assembly on September 24.
Akpabio has also been outside the country. The Senate President was reported in Italy, where he visited the St Padre Pio shrine in San Giovanni Rotondo and said he travelled there to pray for an end to insecurity, banditry and terrorism in Nigeria.
The simultaneous absence of the President, Vice-President and Senate President has shifted attention from their whereabouts to a constitutional question: who is formally empowered to perform the functions of the President?
What Section 145 says
The relevant provision is Section 145 of the 1999 Constitution, as amended.
It states that whenever the President proceeds on vacation or is otherwise unable to discharge the functions of his office, he is to transmit a written declaration to the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Once that declaration is transmitted, the Vice-President performs the functions of the President as Acting President until the President communicates that he is available to resume his functions.
The Constitution also provides a mechanism where the President fails or is unable to transmit the declaration within 21 days.
In that situation, the National Assembly can, through a simple-majority resolution of each chamber, mandate the Vice-President to perform the functions of President as Acting President until the President communicates his availability to resume his functions.
This provision is at the centre of the current debate.
Some lawmakers under the Save Democracy Group have asked the National Assembly leadership to clarify whether Tinubu transmitted the required declaration when he left Nigeria.
The lawmakers have also called for the National Assembly to reconvene if the declaration was not transmitted within the constitutional timeframe and to consider activating Section 145(2).
Does Akpabio automatically become Acting President?
No.
The fact that Tinubu and Shettima are both outside Nigeria does not automatically transfer presidential powers to Akpabio.
Section 146 of the Constitution deals with succession where the office of President becomes vacant through circumstances including death, resignation, impeachment or permanent incapacity.
Under that section, the Vice-President succeeds the President when the presidential office becomes vacant.
The President of the Senate comes into the succession arrangement only where the offices of both President and Vice-President are vacant.
Therefore, physical absence from Nigeria is not the same thing as constitutional vacancy.
The unresolved question
The key issue is therefore not simply whether Tinubu, Shettima or Akpabio are physically in Nigeria.
It is whether Tinubu transmitted the written declaration required under Section 145 when he proceeded on his vacation and, if he did not, whether the National Assembly has taken the constitutional step provided for after 21 days.
The Presidency has maintained that Tinubu remains in charge and continues to direct the affairs of government from abroad.
The State House said that while Tinubu has been away, he has continued to issue directives, including ordering an independent investigation into the deaths of 37 illegal miners in Minna. It also said Shettima was representing the President at official functions while the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, George Akume, continued to represent Tinubu at other events.
Akpabio has similarly rejected the suggestion that his own presence outside Nigeria, together with Tinubu and Shettima, has created a presidential vacancy.
But members of the House of Representatives are demanding that the constitutional position be made clear publicly.
That makes the central question less about where Nigeria’s leaders are and more about what constitutional procedure was followed when the President left the country and what authority is currently being exercised on his behalf.
For now, the available public information confirms that Tinubu remains abroad, Shettima is in New York on official duties, and Akpabio was last publicly reported abroad in Italy.
The Constitution, however, does not provide that simply being outside Nigeria automatically removes presidential authority or transfers it to the Senate President.
