Only two out of 27 senators in the 8th Senate, who defected from the political parties that brought them to the Chamber to other political platforms, survived the tsunami that hit the outgoing Assembly in the February 23 National Assembly elections. The two successful senators, who have also made themselves controversial in the 8th Assembly, are Dino Melaye, representing Kogi West Senatorial District and Ovie Omo-Agege, representing Delta Central. While Melaye defected from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Omo-Agege cross-carpeted from the Labour Party (LP) to the APC. Some of the senators defected in 2016, which was a few months after the apex legislative chamber was inaugurated on June 9, 2015 while others cross-carpeted in 2017 and 2018.
However, the bulk of the opposition senators from the PDP were the ones who first defected to the APC while the majority of the APC members who dumped the party did so last year, during the peak of the political crisis that rocked the ruling party before the primary elections. Although some of the defectors aspired to the governorship of their various states, none of them succeeded while others either lost tickets at the primary polls or at the February elections 2019 general elections. Two critical lawmakers, whose defection and loss attracted peculiar attention in the country, are the President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki and the former Minority Leader of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio. No fewer than 13 senators dumped the APC on July 24, 2018, thinking that they would make better fortunes in the opposition camp in 2019. Saraki, whose leadership has been turbulent from the inception of the 8th Senate, due to his controversial emergence to the apex Senate seat, defected late in 2018.
However, contrary to his calculations, he met constructive total loss, as he lost his Kwara Central Senatorial seat in the February polls, while also losing all his political grips on Kwara politics both at the national and state elections. Similarly, Akpabio, whose defection from the PDP to the APC beat the imagination of most system analysts, on August 7, 2018, forwarded a letter of resignation to the President of the Senate and the Senate Deputy Minority Leader, Emmanuel Bwacha. In the heat of his campaign in the build up to the 2019 general elections, he assured President Muhammadu Buhari and the APC, that he would capture his state, Akwa Ibom, for the ruling party; a promise that created serious panic in the state, and obviously made the home government, under Governor Udom Emmanuel, to prepare for a bitter warfare at the polls.
Conversely, Akpabio crashed out of relevance as he lost his seat in the Senate and also lost the whole state to the PDP, which swept the three seats in the Red Chamber as well as the governorship and all the state assembly seats. Also, one of the senators who defected from the PDP to the APC and contested for the governorship of his state is John Owan Enoh (APC, Cross River Central). He actually got ticket to contest for governorship, but lost to the incumbent Governor Benedict Ayade of the PDP in the March 9 gubernatorial polls in Cross River State. Senator Enoh formally announced his defection from the PDP to the APC on the floor of the Senate on May 9, 2017, and is the current Chairman, Senate Committee on Finance. Senators Sonni Ogbuoji (APC, Ebonyi South) and Hope Uzodinma (APC, Imo West) who were elected to the Senate on the platform of the PDP, defected to APC in 2018 and contested for the governorship of their states, but lost.
