By Kingston Magare 22.9.2026
Nigeria’s number three Godswill Akpabio has played down suggestions he should be the country’s acting President following the absence of President Bola Tinubu and his Vice President Kassim Shettima.
Tinubu has been on vacation for more than three weeks and Mr. Shettima is currently in New York for the United Nations General Assembly leaving. Constitutionally Akpabio being the Senate president is supposed to act in the absence of the President and the Vice.
But speaking Tuesday in Uyo, Akwa Ibom, Akpabio said Tinubu had not relinquished presidential authority.
“I am the Senate president and not the acting President of Nigeria because President Tinubu is still in power. He’s on a working leave, and there’s no absence in Aso Rock,” Akpabio said.
“Right now, there is no vacancy. Asiwaju Tinubu is still in power, and he’s still running the affairs of Nigeria.
“The world is a global village; you can give instructions from the internet. So why are people complaining?” he said.
However, the African Democratic Congress don’t seem to agree. The party argued that the Nigeria’s constitution does not “working vacation.”
“President Tinubu left Nigeria on 30 August and has now been away for more than 21 days. We therefore demand to know whether the required declaration was transmitted by the President. If he did not, we would like to know why the National Assembly has ignored Section 145 of the Constitution,” the party said.
“There is no constitutional category known as a ‘working vacation’. Presidential authority cannot be transferred by convenience, protocol or press statement. Nigeria is a constitutional democracy, not a private enterprise to be managed remotely from a holiday destination,” the ADC said in a statement signed by its national publicity secretary Bolaji Abdullahi.
Tinubu enjoying the company of French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris.