A report that senators will draw N8.64billion as wardrobe allowance sparked a huge row last week. The tension was doused following a clarification that they would get N506,600 each as dressing allowance. Does such profligacy fly in the face of dwindling resources and some states, inability to pay salaries? No, say some lawyers who are demanding a downward review of public officials’ salaries and elimination of some allowances to save cost. They also want the laws on remuneration of public officials reviewed to reflect present realities, writes JOSEPH JIBUEZE.
Lawmakers enjoy the best of two worlds. They do not work full time, yet the country breaks the bank for them. Last week, a report that senators would earn N8.64billion as wardrobe allowance sparked a huge uproar. In the face of cash crunch, with some states unable to pay salaries, many considered it insensitive and a rip-off.
But, Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Allocation Commission (RMFAC) Chairman Mr. Elias Mbam during a courtesy visit to Senate President Bukola Saraki, said each senator would earn N506, 600 as dressing allowance.
“It is 25 per cent of the basic salary for senators and if you apply that, every senator will receive N506, 600 per annum. House of Representatives members receive less but I don’t have the figure,” he said.
What do senators earn?
Based on the 2007 RMFAC approved remuneration for National Assembly members, the lawmakers’ allowances include accommodation (Senator N4m, Rep N3.97m), vehicle loan (Senator N8m, Rep N6.948m), furniture (Senator N6m, Rep N5.956m) and severance gratuity (Senator N6m, Rep N5.956m), which are due once in four years.
Other allowances, which are payable every year, are car maintenance (Senator N1.52m, Rep N595,563), constituency (Senator N5m, Rep N1.687m), domestic staff (Senator N1.5m, Rep N1.488m), personal assistant (Senator N506,600; Rep N496,303), entertainment (Senator N202,640, Rep N198,521), recess (Senator N202,640; Rep N198,521), utilities (Senator N607,920; Rep N397,042), newspaper/periodicals (Senator N303,960; Rep N297,781), house maintenance (Senator N101,320; Rep N99,260) and wardrobe.
Nigerian lawmakers are said to receive salaries which rank the highest in the world, according to a report by The Economist magazine. The report revealed that with a basic salary of $189,500 per annum (about N30.6m), they were the highest paid lawmakers in the world.
According to the report, the basic salary (which excludes allowances) of a Nigerian lawmaker is 116 times the country’s GDP per person of $1,600. The $189,500 earned annually by each Nigerian legislator is estimated to be 52 per cent higher than what Kenya legislators, who are the second highest paid lawmakers, earned.
The figures put salaries of Senators and House of Representatives members way beyond those received by fellow parliamentarians in the 29 countries whose data was analysed by the magazine. In terms of volume of cash earnings, the Nigerian legislators beat their counterparts in Britain who take $105,400 yearly, as well as those in the United States ($174,000), France ($85,900), South Africa ($104,000), Kenya ($74,500), Saudi Arabia ($64,000) and Brazil ($157,600).
Other yearly salary details published by The Economist two years ago are those of lawmakers in Ghana ($46,500), Indonesia ($65,800), Thailand ($43,800), India ($11,200), Italy ($182,000), Bangladesh ($4,000), Israel ($114,800), Hong Kong ($130,700), Japan ($149,700), Singapore ($154,000), Canada ($154,000), New Zealand ($112,500), Germany ($119,500), Ireland ($120,400), Pakistan ($3,500), Malaysia ($25,300), Sweden ($99,300), Sri Lanka ($5,100), Spain ($43,900) and Norway ($138,000).
Constitutional lawyer Prof Itse Sagay (SAN) said the lawmakers’ earning was based on what he called “the locust mentality”.
“What is particularly disturbing is that the National Assembly is completely impervious to public outrage,” he said.
According to Sagay, in spite of dismal standard of living and poverty, coupled with low income per capita, past lawmakers awarded themselves the highest salaries and allowances in the world.
He recalled that in 2009, a senator earned N240million in salaries and allowances, while a member of the House of Representatives earned N203.7million. Converted to dollars at then existing rates, a senator earned $1.7million while his counterpart in America earned $174,000.
“President Obama, president of the richest country in the world, earns $400,000 per annum. The British Prime Minister earns 190,000 pounds. A senator in Nigeria, one of the poorest countries in the world, earned $1.7million per annum. It is absurd. It is, as someone called it, a feeding frenzy,” Sagay said.
Secrecy of actual earnings
The exact amount lawmakers earn in Nigeria is still shrouded in secrecy. Hundreds of billions voted into the National Assembly are allegedly never broken down, which should have shown at least a summary of the legislators’ exact earnings. It has also been alleged that senators allocate money to themselves way above RMAFC stipulations.
Co-founder of Newswatch magazine, Mr Ray Ekpu, who was a member of the last National Conference, criticised the National Assembly for acting above the law on their remuneration.
He said: “You cannot have a National Assembly that operates above the law. Right now, that is what happens. I give a few examples – we spoke to the former Head of RMFAC that is supposed to decide the salaries of public servants and he said that the National Assembly ignored the prescription of the commission and decided on paying itself what it wanted to pay.
“That is a shame because that is an assembly that is supposed to make laws and it cannot be above the law as prescribed by the country. That is the problem. So if they do that, it is a disservice to Nigeria. And you know one of the media agencies as a way of tasting the vitality of the Freedom of Information Act has sent a letter to the National Assembly asking them to inform them on the salaries and allowances of the legislators. They have not complied with that.”
Reducing cost of governance
Analysts say corruption-induced wastage would not be easily stopped because its protagonists or beneficiaries are known to always put up some resistance. However, it will require a focused and determined political will on the part of the government of the day. It will involve curtailing the excesses of a powerful privileged class which has suddenly supplanted the yearnings and aspirations of teeming Nigerians with its bloated appetite for opulent and ostentatious lifestyles.
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr George Oguntade, believes what the lawmakers earn do not reflect present realities.
“Quite frankly, I find it difficult to comprehend the basis upon which the RMFAC has allocated so much money to lawmakers by way of allowances and remuneration, especially given the realities on ground today.
“Laws are never static and should be continually reviewed to reflect the realities in which society finds itself. This is the essence of the Nigerian Law Review Commission. The RMAFC clearly needs to be reviewed and amended though I foresee obstacles in the path of this given that the amenders are major beneficiaries of the law as it currently stands. I believe Nigerians should agitate for an immediate review and put pressure on the National Assembly to give priority to this,” he said.
Reducing the cost of governance will mean cutting down on some of the allowances, such as the one for clothing, Oguntade said.
His words: “Many of these lawmakers are already affluent in their own right given where they are coming from and can certainly do without funds that can be utilised in developing the country. We must not continue to delude ourselves by paying jumbo allowances to lawmakers when we can ill afford to.”
It is also significant that richer countries pay their lawmakers far lesser. Said Oguntade: “Even countries that have the financial capability to do so do not pay much to their lawmakers. It amounts to fiscal irresponsibility and I believe the lawmakers ought to be in the vanguard of calling for the urgent review of the RMAFC. Senegal recently demonstrated fiscal responsibility when it recently voted to abolish its Senate and by so doing, save the sum of US$15million annually and divert same to infrastructural development.”
The senior advocate believes lawmakers should not be paid salaries or constituency allowances, the purpose of which is never verified.
“I also believe that lawmakers should only be entitled to sitting allowances as opposed to a yearly salary. As it is, they spend more time on recess than on real legislative duties and still get paid for the entire year. The country is short changed by this incongruous position and it certainly calls for a review.
“Also, the retinue of aides of lawmakers needs to be reduced drastically. Lawmakers are only able to afford this because they get paid all kinds of allowances, including so-called ‘constituency allowances’. It is incredible that no audit is ever conducted to ascertain the projects to which the so- called ‘constituency allowances’ have been applied to.
“Given the dwindling economy, it is imperative that the lawmakers follow the recent example of the President by agreeing to a substantial reduction in the annual funds allocated to them alone,” Oguntade said.
Reducing recurrent expenditure
To save cost, experts say there is need to substantially cut down on the high recurrent expenditure which had become the norm in federal budgets. Development, they said, would remain a mirage if recurrent expenditure continued to surpass capital budgetary allocations.
Observers say implementing the 2012 Stephen Orosanye-led Presidential Committee on Rehabilitation and Restructuring of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies report would help save cost. The committee recommended efficient down-sizing or consolidation of several ministries, department and agencies in order to check wasteful duplicity of government functions and overhead costs.
There have also been calls for a unicameral legislature which will be run on a part-time basis where the legislature will be constituted by Nigerians who are already gainfully employed in other vocations other than politics.
A former senator, Smart Adeyemi: “We should run a unicameral system and one chamber, so that we can provide water, good roads, electricity and life for people rather than catering for a large number of people who are honourable members or distinguished senators.
“The process of running government should not be more costly than what the system will give to the people. Is it not madness for a governor to appoint 70 special assistants? It is fraud!”
There is also the need to cut down on number of aides and political appointees. President and Chairman of Council, Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN) Mrs. Debola Osibogun advised the government to cut down on the retinue of aides attached to heads of ministries, department and agencies.
“The most important issue which the new federal government must address is the high cost of governance. If you look at the number of special advisers and personal assistants, you will notice that they have rendered the bureaucrats who are in the ministries almost redundant and they get paid. They should allow them to do their jobs and reduce the number of people they bring when they get appointed,” she said.
The government has also been urged to focus on increasing its internally generated revenue (IGR) by harnessing other non-oil sectors. Analysts say Section 22 (1) and (2) of the 2007 Fiscal Responsibility Act has created some loopholes that mean little is remitted to the government treasury. The Nigerian National Petroleum Coorporation (NNPC) and its subsidiaries were discovered to have internally generated as high as N6.20trillion between 2009 and 2011, but made zero remittance, simply because they declared zero operating surpluses.
It has also been suggested that a law should be enacted that will mandate government to henceforth use IGR for recurrent expenses while externally generated revenues only spent on capital projects.
It is believed that should this law be enforced, a revenue inward-looking government should hardly waste any time in sealing off the leakages created in Section 22 (1) of Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2007 by making sure that all its IGR are paid into the Consolidated Revenue Fund Account, where no agency of government should have any drawing right to the account.
A lawyer and a delegate to the National Conference, Chief Bisi Adegbuyi, said the law which allows parastatals to withdraw from the source, the recurrent expenditure content of their budget before remitting whatever remains to the Federation Account, must be reviewed.
“That is the biggest drain pipe and the huge component of the recurrent expenditure content of the federal budget. Why will NNPC withdraw from source unilaterally the amount determined by it as forming the recurrent expenditure and remitting paltry sum to the Federation Account? We need to look at such laws that impinge and impede progress.
“When you spend 72.3 percent of your budget on recurrent expenditure, leaving 27. 7 percent for debt servicing and capital expenditure, certainly, there is no way you can improve on the welfare if the people. The cost of governance in Nigeria is humongous,” he said.
The United States, the most powerful and richest country in the world, is said to have a comparatively slimmer and more cost effective bureaucracy than Nigeria. It has less than 20 federal ministries and secretaries of state (equivalent to Nigeria’s ministers). The British cabinet is smaller than that of Nigeria, which has a minimum of 37 due to Federal Character.
Observers say President Buhari’s objective of economic transformation will be made a lot easier if he can find a way of reducing the huge economic and financial burden of running this country.
Chairman, Lagos Branch of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Mr Alex Muoka believes public service should be about service to humanity and not an avenue for self-enrichment.
“I feel that representative or elective government positions should be seen as more of a call to serve than anything else. Therefore, people who vie for such offices should expect a severe drop in their income rather than the opposite.
“The remuneration attached to such offices should be very basic and almost meagre. It is the prestige that the office carries and the clout and network that should be the payoff. Our situation is the opposite, thus some people go into government to make more money than they could ever have hoped to make from employment or business.
“When we remove all the extravagant allowances and reduce the remuneration attached to political office, we would make it unattractive and then we would begin to attract the kind of good people with a genuine desire to serve that would move this country forward. We would also have drastically reduced the cost of governance,” Muoka said
‘Expunge some allowances’
A Constitutional lawyer, Mr Ike Ofuokwu, called for the abolition of most of the allowances paid lawmakers.
“It is ludicrous, obscene and a violent rape on the Nigerian economy for members of the National Assembly to earn wardrobe allowance where over 65 per cent of the workforce they represent are not paid their salaries for several months now.
“The RMAFC has on its own part over the years become a white elephant project on the Nigerian nation. They should be scrapped and tried in a court of competent jurisdiction for irresponsible fiscal policies that are not in conformity with economic realities and for a deliberate and calculated attempt to bankrupt this nation. I strongly suggest that we should return to the wages and salaries commission.
“I advise members of the National Assembly to speak in one voice and condemn this act of economic terrorism on the Nigerian state or else it will be seen as an act of parliamentary gang-up against the Nigerian workers.
“During campaigns and even after the inauguration, we saw them all adorning flowing lace agbada and designer suits. Of what benefit other than parliamentary stealing is the wardrobe allowance? Some of them are already on salary and pensions for life. Their states are already bleeding as a result of their misadventure in the politics of their states.
“We can now see why our legislators are the highest paid in the world. This is one of the few instances you will find them speak in one voice without a dissenting vote and without party affiliation.
“To reduce the cost of governance, most of the allowances paid members of the National Assembly should be expunged. The job should be made part time and less attractive. By so doing, it will attract brilliant, selfless and financially independent men and women of character and morals,” Ofuokwu said.
However, Mbam said that RMFAC would soon review downward lawmakers’ allowances, taking into consideration state of the economy, rate of inflation, capacity to pay, and the reality of the day.
“The commission is currently reviewing the 2008 Remuneration Act and hopefully we expect it will be ready by the end of the third quarter and once we are ready, we will make it public and of course, present it to the National Assembly,” he said.
