One of Nigeria’s most formidable human rights lawyers put the Federal Government and the political class on notice in the same breath on Monday — demanding an accounting for a ₦15 trillion road that he says has stopped being coastal, and predicting that in 2027, “many people will not be allowed to vote.”
Senior Advocate of Nigeria Femi Falana has publicly challenged the estimated ₦15 trillion cost of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, urging Nigerians to demand accountability from the Federal Government. Speaking at a public event in a video shared by News Central TV on Monday, 12 October 2026, Falana questioned the reported change in the highway’s route from coast to inland. Separately, he warned parties and candidates in Lagos State against election violence and voter suppression ahead of the 2027 general elections, calling for a cross-party united front to protect every eligible voter “irrespective of political affiliation or ethnic background.”
The route is the accusation
Falana’s objection is not simply about price; it is about the definition of what is being purchased. “The road, coastal road has now become land road, I’m sure you are aware,” he said. “What I’m saying is that, after Ogun State, they now said they are going from Edo to go by land, because they can’t fund it. Again, we must now ask questions: What are the 15 trillion naira earmarked for that road?” The argument is exact: if the engineering scope has been abandoned because the money is unavailable, the original cost basis no longer describes the project — and the published figure no longer answers the question of what citizens are paying for.
What the government has said
The Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway is a flagship infrastructure project of President Bola Tinubu’s administration, designed to link Lagos with Calabar in Cross River State along Nigeria’s southern coastline, at an estimated ₦15 trillion on completion. It has drawn sustained public argument over cost, route and funding. The Works Minister, Dave Umahi, has been widely reported as stating that the road will no longer hug the coast after Ogun but will instead detour inland through Edo State to join the East-West Road — the shift Falana is reacting to. Fact-check note: confirm the minister’s exact wording and date against a primary transcript before publication.
Why the accountability frame matters
Falana located the failure not with officials but with citizens: that public officials act without sufficient oversight because scrutiny is optional. “And that is the only way we can get these people to be accountable,” he said. It is his longstanding position — accountability as a civic duty that must be exercised, not a courtesy extended by the state.
The second warning is darker
Turning to Lagos politics, Falana argued that recent electoral history predicts organised exclusion rather than mere competition. “Let me now warn the candidates: Going by what happened during the last election, violence will be introduced. Many people will not be allowed to vote, unless you guys are ready to form, regardless of your political parties, to form a group that will defend the vote of everybody in Lagos,” he said.
The ethnic dimension named plainly
Falana specifically cautioned against ethnic identity as a tool of intimidation against residents perceived as not belonging to the Yoruba community in Lagos. He referenced those who “resort to violence, thuggery,” and the logic of “where you come from, that you don’t look like a Yoruba man, therefore you must not vote. In Lagos, in Nigeria, that must not be allowed.” On the standard of appearance itself, he was cutting: “We didn’t fight for this rickety democracy, that somebody will look at your face: ‘Oh, you should not vote in this country.’” The word rickety does double duty — a concession that Nigerian democracy is fragile, and a refusal to let its fragility become an excuse for anyone’s disenfranchisement.
Why these two statements belong together
Read separately, they look like a fundraising complaint and an election warning. Read together, they are one thesis: unaudited money and unguarded ballots are the same failure. A ₦15tn project whose route can change without a public accounting is the fiscal expression of a system that does not expect to be questioned — and an election in which violence removes voters is the political expression of the same assumption. Falana’s proposed remedy in both cases is identical and deliberately unglamorous: citizens and rivals watching together, across party and ethnicity.
The gap left open
No reaction from the Federal Ministry of Works or the Presidency had been published as of the reporting date. Any balanced piece should seek it, and should note that a route revision can be legitimate — technical, geotechnical, environmental or cost-engineering reasons can justify an inland alignment. Falana’s claim is about unexplained revision, not revision as such. The honest framing gives the government its rebuttal and still holds the ₦15tn question open.
The bottom line
Falana has not alleged corruption; he has posed a question with no answer yet, and issued a warning nobody has denied. The ₦15 trillion deserves a published scope document, a route justification and a funding breakdown. The 2027 vote deserves a cross-party security pact in Lagos before the season starts, not a communiqué afterwards. One is a budget question. The other is a democracy question. He is right that they are the same conversation.
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