Drama in Reps as Benue Lawmaker, Agbese denies endorsing Ugochinyere as minority leader

On Thursday, the House of Representatives became pretty chaotic after Philip Agbese, a deputy spokesperson, said his signature was forged on a list of lawmakers who supposedly supported Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere for Minority Leader.

The news floating around was that 61 members from the Minority Caucus signed off on supporting Ugochinyere, who’s with the Action People’s Party (APP).

Agbese claimed he didn’t actually endorse Ugochinyere and added that seeing his fake signature published was a violation of his rights as a lawmaker.

So, he brought it up during a session about members’ privileges. Turns out, his name and an allegedly fake signature were there on the document too.

“Yesterday I saw a document on the internet with my name reportedly nominating a member of this House for the post of minority leader,” he said.

“I had conversed, deliberated and visited many members of this House. One of the persons I had such discussions with was my colleague, Honourable Ikenga Ugochinyere. Our discussion was basically centred on the welfare of members of the minority.

“Number two was on the issue of the executive not adhering to issues concerning our constituency projects,” he said.

“The person who signed this document, Honourable Seyi, I have not seen him since December 2025, so I am at a loss and I feel that my legislative privilege has been breached because this amounts to forgery for my signature to be used for purposes which were not intended,” he said.

“I saw on a social media blog that members have received a certain amount of money. I have not received any amount of money from anybody,” he said.

“My constituents have been calling me to know. This is not the first time my name is being mentioned in an issue like this. I don’t want to be involved and I don’t want my name to be further maligned as far as this is concerned because I have a right as a member of this House for my privileges to be fully protected,” he added.