Senator Godswill Akpabio, has been elected president of the Nigerian senate following voting by senators on Tuesday morning.
Akpabio, a senator from the southern state of Akwa Ibom becomes the 9th head of the Nigerian senate since the country returned to democracy in 1999.
The 61 year-old senator scored 63 votes to defeat his sole rival Senator Abdulaziz Yari from the northwestern state of Zamfara who got 46 votes. They are both from the ruling APC party which has majority members in the senate.
The new senate president was a governor of Akwa Ibom from 2007 to 2015 before becoming a senator, and then in 2019 appointed the minister of Niger-Delta affairs - overseeing matters relating to Nigeria's oil-producing region.
He returned to the senate after being elected in last February's elections to represent Akwa Ibom South-West district.
Being a Christian from southern Nigeria, his election as the senate president is seen partly as a political attempt by the ruling APC party to balance up power between the country's religions and regions.
Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his deputy Kashim Shettima are both Muslims though from different regions. They were sworn in last month.
The Senate has been inaugurated on Tuesday shortly after Akpabio's election. Senator Baurau Jibrin from the northern state of Kaduna has been elected the deputy senate president.
