Legislators' Jumbo Pay Attracts Jeers, Knocks

By PETER-CLAVER EGBOCHUE

Recently, the Senate President, David Mark told a delegation of Middle Belt elders, who paid him a courtesy call in Abuja that Nigerians have no justifiable reasons to continue to suffer, 48 years after independence.
Mark acknowledged that it was wrong for Nigerians to still talk about bad road networks, lack of good health facilities, potable water, unemployment and poverty several years after independence.
He said the country ought to have moved from its current state of under-development because of its huge natural and human resource base which is second to none in the African continent.
Unfortunately, reports say out of 140 million Nigerians, about 70 per cent live below $100 per day while about 40 per cent is currently unemployed.
Despite this frightening picture, the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) recently jolted many Nigerians when it announced that it has increased the salaries and allowances of law makers, judicial and public officers nationwide by over 100 per cent.
The adjustment of salaries and allowances is coming eight years after a similar exercise which generated serious controversy but was ratified by the law makers who were the beneficiaries.
A Commissioner with RMAFC, Mr. Emmanuel, Nnamani, while announcing the new package reasoned that given the economic realities, the increment had become necessary.
His words, “it is true that we have increased the salaries and remuneration packages in line with our mandate. But we did not increase on the basis of percentage. The whole increase was done across the board for political officers, law makers and judicial officers. The increase has also taken effect because it has been approved accordingly.”
Nnamani stated that RMAFC considered its constitutional responsibility before approving the increase.
According to Section 32(d) of the Third Schedule of the 1999 Constitution RMAFC is empowered to fix the remuneration of office holders.
The section reads: “The RMAFC shall have power to determine the remuneration appropriate for political office holders, including the president, vice president, governors, deputy governors, ministers, commissioners, special advisers, legislators and the holders of offices mentioned in Sections 84 and 124 of this constitution.
He added that the RMAFC had considered certain economic indices before coming up with 100 per cent increase. “The economic factors are changes in the basic fundamentals of the Nigerian economy, external reserve and the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate;” the commissioner said.
Other indices, according to Nnamani are rates of inflation and the need for a living wage to ensure honesty and dignity of the office holders.
By the new increased package, a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria earns N2,484,242.50 as against N993,697.00 old package while his counterpart in the House of Representatives earns a monthly package of N1,985,212.50 as against the old package N794,084.00.
This jumbo package has been generating jeers and knocks across the country, with analysts wondering why this category of Nigerians are considered for enhanced packages while the majority of Nigerians wallow in abject penury without the basic facilities, as acknowledged by the Senate President.
One of the groups piqued by the jumbo package for legislators is the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC). It advised the government to extend the package to other categories of workshops since the rate of inflation in the country affects all.
NLC President, Comrade Abdulwaheed Omar, in a statement in Abuja, pointed out that other categories of workers should not be left out of the process of review of wages and allowances since they suffer even more.
Omar argued that the proposed wage review for lawmakers was not in the best interest of the country's already impoverished workforce, stressing that regular increase in the emoluments of political office holders would aggravate the already bloated cost of running public offices.
His words: “Given Nigeria's current level of development and the need to ensure prudent use of resources, the nation can ill-afford the massive cost of running government much of which go into the allowances of office holders. In advanced and emerging democracies, selfless services are the operative philosophy in the compensation of parliamentarians and other political office holders”.
NLC's reaction came just as fresh facts emerged recently that political office holders, law makers and judges demanded the 100 per cent increase in their wages.
The new package if allowed to stay is estimated to cost the country some N1,126 trillion yearly.
Meanwhile, the Transitional Monitoring Group (TMG) and Afenifere, the predominant Yoruba socio-political group have condemned as scandalous and self-serving the proposed increase in the salaries and perks of political office holders.
The Secretary General of Afenifere, Senator Femi Okunrounmu said the step taken by the RMAFC was not in public interest.
Afenifere scribe, who was an AD Senator between May 1999 and 2003 said it was scandalous for the law makers to revel in opulence while the people they claimed to be representing wallowed in abject poverty.
Apart from the statutory salaries and allowances, he revealed that there were other fringe benefits accruing to the law makers which are hidden to the public.
“That is scandalous. The salaries are only a small portion of the remuneration package which they share every mouth which Nigerians don't know about.
If details of the money being paid to the political office holders monthly are known to the public, it will expose how Nigerians are being raped by its leaders.
“These people are pauperising the people they pretend to be representing and they are happy about it. We condemn outrightly such scandalous package the law makers have approved for themselves.”
In the same vein, the Chairman of TMG, Mr. Moshood Erubami argued that political office holders had not demonstrated any justification for such increase. He said it was disturbing that the country had only witnessed multiplication of exotic cars, building of new houses and other frivolous spending among the law makers at the state and national levels in the past nine years.
Erubami opined that with the way the politicians were going about approving jumbo pay for themselves, they might be unwittingly building the capacity of the people to revolt very soon.
Only recently, teachers in the public school, across the country embarked on strike to press home their demand for an enhanced salary structure. Regrettably, the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission, the National Assembly and the Federal Government did not consider their demand appropriate in the light of economic realities and staggering inflation rate.
Analysts are worried that federal and state governments are not utilising the enormous resources at their disposal to better the lots of Nigerian masses especially the army of unemployed youth, adding that the future of tomorrow leaders are being toyed with by the government of the day.