Summary
Immigration officers have returned Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan’s passport after she went live on Facebook to protest its seizure at the Abuja airport. The Kogi Central lawmaker accused Senate President Godswill Akpabio of ordering the seizure without any court order.
On November 4, 2025, immigration officers returned Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan’s passport after she went live on Facebook to protest its seizure at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja.
The Kogi Central lawmaker had raised alarm during a Facebook live, accusing immigration officers of unlawfully withholding her passport and preventing her from travelling.
She confronted the officers and recounted in the live video, demanding to know what offence she had committed to justify such action.
“I’ve just completed two years in office. I decided to take a week off, and now my passport has been withheld again,” she said. “This is the same thing that happened earlier this year. I have committed no offence, and there is no court order restricting my movement.”
In the video, she accused Senate President Godswill Akpabio of giving the order for her passport to be seized.
Senator Natasha described the action as an unlawful restriction of her movement and a gross violation of her fundamental rights.
“This same thing happened before when I was stopped from travelling even though I had committed no offence, and there was no court order restricting me,” she said.
“The last time this happened, the officer in charge told me that the Senate President, Senator Godswill Akpabio, instructed them to withhold my passport and prevent me from travelling because he claimed that each time I go abroad, I ‘spoil the image of the country’ by granting interviews to international media.”
According to the Kogi lawmaker, Senator Akpabio was the person who gave the order until the intervention of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the last time such an incident occurred.
“Godswill Akpabio has instructed the Controller General of Customs to withhold my passport. This is wrong,” she said.
She disclosed that the two federal cases pending against her were withdrawn after President Bola Tinubu intervened, when the president instructed the Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, to withdraw all cases in the court filed by the Federal Government against her.
She added that she has never defaulted in any court appearance, insisting she is neither a flight risk nor a criminal.
After the passport was returned, she reacted by saying, “Sometimes one has to be a rebel to get things right.”
