House Accuses Senate Of Undermining Its Legislative Activities; Steps Down All Bills From Red Chamber

By Suleiman Anyalewechi

The House of Representatives on Wednesday July 2, 2025, ignited a cold war with the Senate following its decision to step down all bills forwarded from the red chamber for concurrence.

The green chamber of the National Assembly said the tit-for tat policy was borne out of the Senate’s somewhat consistent disregard for over 140 bills sent to it for same concurrence purposes.

Arising from a very heated debate, the House at the end of plenary resolved to pay back the Senate in its coins for  its relentless efforts at undermining their legislative activities.

The resolution was sequel to the adoption of a motion raised by the House Minority Leader Kingsley Chinda in response to a Senate bill seeking to amend the Federal Orthopedic Hospital Management Act to allow for the setting up of the Federal Orthopedic Hospital Obokun, in Osun state.

Curiously, the bill was sponsored by the Senate Leader, Bamidele Okpeyemi.

Trouble had started following the decision of the presiding officer to yield the floor to Hon Chinda for the purpose of seconding the motion for the bill to be go for a second reading.

But rather than seconding the bill which had been officially approved for consideration by the Committee of the Whole, the Obio/Akpor Federal Constituency lawmaker berated the red chamber for its penchant for  holding down bills from the House.

“I am reluctantly supporting the motion for second reading. This is because we don’t get the same cooperation from the Senate.

“Mr Speaker, having said so, I will reluctantly second the motion for the second reading of this bill.”

His position was re-echoed by many contributors who called for the application of the principle of “reciprocity” in handling bills and other matters emanating from the Senate.

“My suggestion is that the Rules and Business Committee of the House should liaise with the their counterpart in the Senate ,to sign a deal.

“They have withheld bills from the House several times in the past .It is better we make it known to them to the effect that if they don’t treat our bills ,we will not also attend to theirs.

“Let there be tit-for-tat because the House of Representatives is an institution that cannot be undermined by the Senate and vice versa”, Hon Ahmed Jaha from Borno state noted.

The House resolved to step down all bills from the Senate pending the resolution of differences between two Chambers.

But before arriving at the decision to halt concurrence debates on Senate bills, the House asked Hon Chinda for an amendment of his motion from ‘reluctantly supporting the motion for second reading’ to that of an outright rejection.”

“If I am given the opportunity to review my position you know that I would not want to support the second reading of the bill.

“I will, therefore, ask that we step it down and then have a meeting with the leadership of the Senate to resolve this issue”, Hon.Chinda, said.

Earlier, the Speaker, Rt Hon Tajudeen Abass, while suing for calm expressed serious concern over the development .

He called for the adoption of common ground in handling the matter.