Etok was elected to the Nigerian Senate for the Akwa Ibom North West Senatorial District in 2007. Akwa Ibom may be the largest producer of crude oil among the Delta states. In May 2009, Etok petitioned the president to allow Akwa-Ibom State to nominate the managing director of the
Niger Delta Development Commission. In 2009, he sponsored a bill to provide for the establishment of the Environmental Managers Registration Council of Nigeria. As chairman of the Senate Committee on Rules and Business, Senator Etok faced criticism for the fact that in 2008 the Nigerian Senate only showed up to work for 90 days and passed only eight of the 120 bills submitted. Etok explained that lawmaking was slow because it is a thorough process that involves numerous steps. However, Etok noted that the senate passed 199 bills in the 10 years from 1999 to 2009, and told reporters that the upper chamber had done "very well in 10 years". He was appointed a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, chaired by
Joel Danlami Ikenya, which in 2009 was trying to push through the Financial Reporting Council Bill. In July 2009, a motion sponsored by Senator
Bassey Ewa-Henshaw and others to force the naming of directors of failed banks involved in insider loan abuses concerning N94.4bn of government agency funds was dropped. Senator Etok stated that he had been at an overseas conference at the time, and was not aware of what had happened. Etok was re-elected on the PDP platform as senator for Akwa Ibom North West in April 2011. He polled 383,607 votes to defeat the
Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) candidate, Joe Ukpong, who scored 11,827 votes. ==References==