Claim: Mudashiru Obasa, the Lagos State Assembly’s impeached Speaker, is Nigeria’s longest-serving speaker.

Verdict: False
Background
An online news website, Blueprint Newspaper, has claimed that the impeached speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Mr. Mudashiru Obasa, is the longest-serving speaker of the state assembly in the country.

On January 14th, 2025, the newspaper published a news report under the headline “Obasa: How Lagos Assembly Ousted Nigeria’s Longest-Serving Speaker.” The news headline suggested that Mr. Mudashiru Obasa has outlasted some of his former counterparts who have led the state legislative chambers across the country.

The impeachment of Mr. Obasa took place in his absence during the plenary session on Monday, January 13th, 2025. According to multiple reports, the state lawmakers reached a general consensus to remove the honourable representative of Agege Constituency 1, who has also been the speaker of the house since 2015.

The members of the state legislature accused Mr. Obasa of gross misconduct and financial mismanagement of funds and replaced him with Mrs. Mojisola Meranda, the lawmaker representing Apapa Constituency 1, as the first female speaker of the state.

While his impeachment has sparked some controversy in the state with allegations that his removal was politically motivated and that his longstanding feud with the state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, facilitated it, some political analysts have questioned the process, citing him as the longest-serving speaker who should have been present to witness his removal.

The NDR has been prompted by these reactions to verify whether Mr. Obasa is indeed the longest-serving speaker of the state house assembly, to rectify the record in Nigerian political history, and to verify the truthfulness of the claim, as it could potentially mislead the public.

Verification
We conducted a keyword search on Google to verify the claim that Mr. Obasa is the longest-serving speaker of the state house of assembly in Nigeria. Our findings revealed that Abdulkarim Lawan of the Borno State House of Assembly is the longest-serving speaker of the state house of assembly nationwide.

On February 9, 2012, Abdulkarim Lawan won his first election as speaker of the Borno State House of Assembly, a position he still holds today, according to media reports here and here. The media reports show consecutive reelections of Mr. Lawan as the speaker of the lawmakers in 2015, 2019, and 2023.

Mr. Lawan has served as the speaker of the Borno State House of Assembly for 13 years, having held the position since February 2012.

On his part, Mudashiru Obasa was first elected on June 8, 2015, to succeed his predecessor, Adeyemi Ikuforiji, and he was in the seat till he was impeached on January 13th, 2025, having spent nine years and seven months as the head of Lagos lawmakers.

Conclusion
We examined the existing records of past and current speakers in Nigeria and found that Abdulkarim Lawan, the current speaker of the Borno State House of Assembly, is the longest-serving speaker of the state legislative arm. Therefore, the claim that Obasa is the longest-serving speaker in Nigeria is false.