Emmanuel Dangana Ocheja listenⓘ is a Nigerian Senator who represented Kogi East senatorial district in the National Assembly, and a member of the All Progressives Congress.

[3][4] Barrister Ocheja did his National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) at the Faulty of Law at the Ahmadu Bello University in the 1982/1983 session.

[citation needed] In 2005, President Olusegun Obasanjo appointed Barrister Ocheja to serve as the Chairman of the board of directors of the Integrated Data Services Limited (IDSL: A subsidiary of the NNPC).

[7][8] In late 2010, Ocheja declared his intention to contest elections into the National Assembly of Nigeria to serve as Senator in the 7th (2011–2015) session on the platform of the People's Democratic Party.

He contested the primary elections against Ambassador Isaac Onu (then Nigerian Ambassador to Botswana), AVM Isaac Alfa (a former Chief of Air Staff 1999–2001), Attai Aidoko Usman (then Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on the FCT), Barrister Kabiru Mohammed, Abdulrahman Abubakar (a former Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation), Hajiya Halima Alfa, and a number of others.

[9] Ocheja also won the general elections against his main challenger Attai Aidoko Usman who flew the flag of the All Nigeria Peoples Party.

[citation needed] President Goodluck Jonathan (as Chairman of Authority of Heads of states of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria) administered the oath of office to Senator Ocheja to serve as a member of the Nigerian delegation to the ECOWAS regional parliament on 11 August 2011.

He was also named as a member of the senate committees on Defense & Army, Appropriation, Gas, Judiciary, Human Rights & Legal Matters, and Privatization.

The resignation confirmed rumors of his displeasure with the PDP establishment that had started in 2012 when he declined an offer extended to him by Governor Idris Ichalla Wada to serve as the Chairman of the Board of the Town Planning Development Authority in Kogi state.

At the event of his decamping, he pledged to work towards delivering victory to all the candidates seeking electoral offices on the platform of the APC in Kogi State.

He served as the Chairman of the Legal Committee of the All Progressives Congress Presidential, National Assembly, and Governorship election campaigns in Kogi state in 2015.

He worked to convince northern Christians like himself to embrace the APC's muslim-muslim ticket by urging voters to focus on the positive performance records of the candidates rather than on their religious leaning.