by Olaitan Babatunde

There is a road somewhere in Nigeria that has become a political personality. The potholes have names, the flooded sections have stories, and every time a vehicle disappears into one, someone remembers the senator. “Our senator has done nothing,” people say. Sometimes that criticism is justified. But sometimes, the senator is being blamed for a job that does not belong to him in the first place. One of the biggest problems in Nigerian politics is that citizens often know who they voted for, but not exactly what they voted that person into office to do.

Nigeria has three levels of government, federal, state and local, and each has different responsibilities. A senator belongs to the federal legislature. His primary job is not to supervise road construction in his senatorial district. The National Assembly makes laws, represents citizens and exercises oversight over government institutions. The Senate itself describes lawmaking, representation and oversight as core functions of the legislature. So when a senator stands beside a newly constructed road and says “I did this road”, citizens should ask a very simple question: was this a legislative intervention, a constituency project included in the federal budget, or is the senator taking credit for an executive project?

The confusion becomes clearer when we look at the Constitution. The Fourth Schedule specifically assigns local government councils functions including the construction and maintenance of roads, streets, drains and other public facilities. This means that if the terrible road outside your house is a local road, the first person you should be asking questions of may be your local government chairman, not your senator. State governments also have responsibilities over roads within their jurisdiction, while the federal government is responsible for federal matters, including federal trunk roads. The Exclusive Legislative List specifically includes traffic on federal trunk roads. Of course, the reality is not always this neat because roads can intersect different levels of government and federal projects can appear inside local communities. But knowing which government has responsibility is the starting point for demanding accountability.

So where does your senator come in? A senator can raise an issue affecting his constituency, sponsor legislation, question government agencies, participate in committees and use legislative oversight to demand explanations about public projects. The National Assembly itself says its committees scrutinise bills, motions and government activities, while lawmakers are expected to carry out oversight and constituency representation. That means a senator may not personally have the authority to pick up a shovel and repair your road, but he can ask why a federal road has been abandoned, summon the responsible agency where appropriate, push an issue onto the legislative agenda and demand answers from the executive. That is influence and oversight, not executive power.

The bigger problem, then, is not simply that Nigerians blame the wrong politician. It is that politicians sometimes benefit from the confusion too. A lawmaker who presents himself as the person responsible for every borehole, road, transformer or classroom in his district can make citizens believe that representation is mainly about bringing physical projects home. Meanwhile, the harder parts of the job, such as making good laws, scrutinising budgets, questioning public agencies and protecting citizens from abuse of power, receive less attention. Citizens should therefore change the question. Instead of only asking, “What has my senator built?”, ask, “What laws has my senator supported? What has he questioned? What government agency has he held accountable? What federal projects has he tracked? And when something is wrong in my community, which level of government is actually responsible?” Democracy becomes more useful when citizens know exactly who to hold responsible for what. Otherwise, we may spend four years shouting at the wrong office while the pothole quietly enjoys another term.