President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, has jokingly told a colleague, Senator Osita Ngwu to stop admiring and describing Bianca Odumegwu as being beautiful.
Akpabio deployed this sense of humour in the Senate on Wednesday during the screening and confirmation hearing of ministers.
The intervention was also dramatic as he picked on Senator Osita Ngwu for praising the beauty of Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu during the exercise.
He told the senator to stop admiring the beauty of the ex-beauty queen and Nigeria’s one-time Ambassador, Bianca Ojukwu.
Bianca had read her credentials before the Senate and was thereafter asked questions by the lawmakers.
She was screened for the post of Minister of State Foreign Affairs.
When Akpabio opened the floor for questions, Ngwu, Senator representing Enugu West District, started by applauding Bianca’s beauty for which he attracted a rebuke.
“Mr President, the beautiful nominee standing before us…,” the lawmaker said in its opening gambit with a swift intervention by the Senate President, Akpabio, who told him to “restrict yourself to the resume. Forget this word beautiful.”
Akpabio interjected jocularly, saying “She didn’t put in the CV that she is beautiful.”
The conversation between Ngwu and Akpabio elicited laughter from Senators.
Ngwu thereafter proceeded to commend the profile and competence of the nominee.
Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu is an accomplished diplomat, lawyer, businesswoman, and ex beauty pageant
In 2011, President Goodluck Jonathan appointed Bianca as Senior Special Assistant on Diaspora Affairs.
She was later appointed as Nigeria’s ambassador to Ghana and later Ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain.
She is Nigeria’s permanent representative to the United Nations World Tourism Organization.
She is the widow of the former Biafra warlord, Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu.