The Nation Newspaper

Tag: pay

  • Abia govt orders firm to pay workers

    The government of Abia State has ordered the management of the rubber company operating in Ameke and Ndi Oji Abam in Arochukwu Local Government Area to pay up its workers salaries within two days.

    Commissioner for Agriculture Uzor Azubuike gave the order at the weekend when he visited the rubber estates. He gave the company managing the Abia Rubber Company till Tuesday to clear the salary arrears or have themselves to blame.

    Azubuike also ordered that new rubber lumps should not be carried out of the premises until all outstanding debts are cleared, stressing that the company should not be making money while their workers suffered.

    He expressed disappointment that for more than a year, the investor had not remitted its dues to the state government, even failing to keep to the terms of the agreement, including replacing the ageing rubber trees.

    The commissioner said the government would not allow anyone frustrate its effort of using agriculture to revive the economy, pointing out that the era when government depends of federation account is over.

    Traditional ruler of Ovukwu Abam, Eze Oji Ojembe expressed dissatisfaction with the operations of the investor, Imoniyame, saying the investor has not lived up to expectation since it took over the management of the rubber estates.

     

  • Construction workers seek more pay

    The National Union of Civil Engineering Construction, Furniture and Wood Workers (NUCECFWW) has demanded the review of its members salaries nationwide.

    Speaking to newsmen in Lagos during the week, its National President, Comrade Amaechi Asugwuni, said its members in the sector were facing economic hardship that necessitated the demand for salary review to cushion the hardship and also create industrial harmony in the sector.

    Asugwuni said it was the responsibility of the Federation of Construction Industry (FoCI) as the employers’ regulatory body to call for salary review, adding that in accordance with the collective bargaining procedure, the salary review was due in December last year as the last review was in 2013. He said the employers’ body had failed to respect or honour the procedure.

    The union chief said FOCI being the employers’ body was deliberately delaying the review of the salary in spite of several negotiations between it and the union’s leadership.

    He emphasised that the employers must be in line and guided by global best practice in industrial relations, quality of working conditions and regulations.

    Asugwuni said the union is acting in accordance with rules of the National Joint Industrial Council (NJIC) agreement over negotiating a review of workers salary every two years.

    He said the workers have been supportive and tolerant of the employers’ action, even when they embark on massive retrenchment in the sector which they blamed on the present economic downturn.

    Asuguni added that employers have continued to sack workers as a result of the dwindling fortune of the economy as one person now does the job of three persons adding that the only way to compensate workers for excess job is to increase their salaries.

    He said the union has begun nationwide interactive consultation and mobilisation of  members to map out action plans on the way forward for the union, stressing that the union would not hesitate to embark on a nationwide industrial action to compel FOCI to implement the salary review.

  • Journalists’ pay not so ridiculous

    SIR: I wish to debunk the claim made by your columnist, Olatunji Olopade, published in The Nation of Friday November 13 about the remuneration of journalists.

    He wrote that “The descent and humiliation of the journalist still persists in the hands of his employer; salaries still range from N15, 000 per month at entry level to N70, 000 per month at managerial level in most media organisations. Just three media houses endeavour to pay fairly and this has led to the metamorphosis of the journalist into an aberration of the watchdog he ought to be to society.”

    As an experienced journalist, I am not aware of any media house paying N15,000 as entry salary to pen-pushers and N70,000 to managers. His claim that only three media companies pay fairly well is totally false.

    Very many media houses have ‘fairly’ good pay for workers. We can talk of low pay, poor pay or non-regular payment of salaries to journalists as you have in some other professions, but to talk of N15,000 as entry package and N70,000 at managerial level for journalists is utterly ridiculous and completely false.

    Nonetheless, there is need for employers to increase the pay of not just journalists but other administrative workers in media establishments. Salary must be regular and paid as and when due. This will boost the morale of journalists and put them in a better position to fulfil their constitutional responsibility of holding government accountable to the people.

     

    • Johnson Adeniyi,

    Ilorin, Kwara State

     

  • Osun debunks PDP’s allegation of pay cut

    Osun debunks PDP’s allegation of pay cut

    The Osun State government has said it is not cutting salaries as speculated by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    It urged the PDP to bury its head in shame as the architect of the various belt-tightening measures which Nigeria must adopt to ensure its survival.

    The government said it was laughable for the PDP to think that it made any expose out of its mischievous statement when it accused the Rauf Aregbesola administration of cutting workers’ salaries and introducing other measures.

    In a statement by the Director, Bureau of Communication and Strategy, Office of the Governor, Semiu Okanlawon, the government said while there was no attempt at reducing salaries, it was working on measures to keep the state afloat. It accused the PDP of creating an economic crisis during its 16 years of misrule.

    The statement reads: “If the PDP thought it made any news of the removal of overtime allowance of some staff of some government agencies, it must be deceiving itself.

    “If not mischief, how does that translate to cutting of salaries and retrenchment of workers? This is because there is no measure being taken that is not an outcome of rigorous deliberations with workers and other critical stakeholders.”

    The government urged Nigerians to ask the PDP the basis of its unfounded allegations and other tantrums, adding that in no way will the party be excused from the economic woes the country now faces.

    The statement said whoever failed to admit that Nigeria was facing serious economic crisis must be living in the moon, adding: “It is no longer news that the economy of Nigeria and most of the world is in crisis, especially those depending on oil.

    “If the PDP wants to be honest, can the party exonerate itself from the economic morass Nigeria finds itself  today? Even before the unfortunate decline in the sale of crude at the international market, Nigeria endured a most horrendous case of bleeding in the economy.’’

  • Pensioners seek intervention on pay

    The Southeast zone of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners (NUP) has urged the Federal Government to intervene on their pensions and gratuities unpaid for over 15 years in some states in the region. Their appeal was contained in a six-point communiqué issued by the union at the end of its zonal meeting in Abakaliki.

    The communiqué which was signed by the zonal chairman, Prince Clement Igwe and secretary, Mr Livinus Ashiegbu condemned the pension situation in the region, saying, “The governments are woefully unfriendly and insensitive to the plight of pensioners. Based on this development, the forum is calling on President Muhammadu Buhari to intervene in order to resolve the situation.

    The pensioners urged the federal government to make a policy on the fate of pensioners

    who retired from July 2007.

    The meeting also urged the government to compel state governments who have not implemented the contributory Pensions Act of 2004 to do so immediately.

    Giving the situation report about pensioners in Abia the state secretary, Elder Onwunmere Arungwa noted that pensioners who retired in 1999 and subsequent years (15 years) were yet to receive their gratuities.

    He said that the situation was the same with the monthly pension scheme which was in arrears of several months.

    “It is unfortunate that some pensioners in Abia still receive less than N1,000 a month due to non implementation of the various pension increases,” he said.

    On its part, the Imo state chairman of the union, Chief Gideon Ezeji said that retired primary school teachers in the state were being owed 20 months of pensions and gratuities by the present administration while “pensions are still worked out on N6,500 out-dated minimum wage.’’

    “The only explanation the governor is giving to Imo state pensioners is that he has not received any bailout for the payment of pensions and gratuities to Imo pensioners.

    “The pensioners of Imo state are at sea as to what they have done to merit the present death sentence by our governor,” he said.

     

  • ‘I won’t pay with new structure’

    ‘I won’t pay with new structure’

    Ebonyi State Governor Dave Umahi has said he will not implement the new salary structure in paying workers because according to him, it gave a seven per cent increment to junior workers and 125 per cent to the senior workers.

    Workers had been on seven days warning strike to demand payment with the new salary structure.

    Governor Umahi spoke at the weekend while inaugurating 15 heavy-duty trucks procured for infrastructural development.

    He acknowledged the bulletin by the organised labour calling for the strike, saying he could not stop them.

    “I saw the bulletin circulated by the organised labour and I cannot stop them from going on strike. But I want them to know very well that we will not implement their demand, we will not do that.

    “I will continue to pay them with the salary structure recommended by the Sam Egwu-led committee until the next two months when an acceptable chart will be out.”

    Umahi expressed shock that the workers went on strike without considering the economic situation, insisting he could not use the money meant to develop the state to pay workers’ salaries.

  • Ex-appointees beg Okorocha for pay

    Former political appointees in the Imo State House of Assembly, including personal aides and drivers of former lawmakers, have appealed to Governor Rochas Okorocha to include them in the payment of salary arrears.

    They begged the governor to “temper justice with mercy” and order for the payment of their May salaries.

    In a statement by Mr. Ikenna Obi, the former appointees explained that the initial misconception, which delayed the payment of their salaries had been resolved, adding that their salaries were determined by the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission’s provisions and as such, “no appointee could earn higher than what is provided by the regulatory body, except for some senior aides whose statutory hazard allowances where included in their last salaries, which explained the seven million naira difference in the approved salary.”

  • Pay cut for public officers

    All things being equal, a new salary and allowances structure for public officers in the country will come into effect in a matter of weeks now. The new regime which will see to the downward review of the current takings of national assembly members and sundry public officers is dictated by the desire to align them to the nation’s subsisting economic and political realities.

    The Chairman of the Revenue, Mobilization, Allocation and Fiscal Commission RMAFC, Mr. Elias Mbam said last week after meeting President Buhari that the new slashed pay structure would be released in September. According to him, “we are presently reviewing the subsisting remuneration package and it is going to reflect the socio-economic realities of today. We expect that before the end of next month it will be ready”

    The disclosure by the RMFAC boss should not come as a surprise. Before now, especially since the coming on stream of the current administration, agitations have been rife for the slashing of the salaries and allowances earned by our law makers. The widely held belief has been that their pay packages were out of tune with subsisting economic realities. And with the slide in the price of oil in the face of the increasing inability of state governments to pay workers’ salaries and allowances, it became obvious that something had to give way.

    There was also this rush to cut salaries by some governors both for themselves and their political appointees. The pressure became such that the commission had little option than to set up a committee for the same purpose which outcome is the reduced salary structure that is expected to be unfolded soon.

    Against this background, there is everything to expect that the new pay structure is a foregone reality. What is still left to conjecture is the percentage of the previous pay that will be affected by the cut. For now, there seems little anybody can do since the commission is constitutionally charged with the fixing of such remunerations. So it is not an issue the national assembly or other public officers have a choice over.

    But beyond the powers of the RMFAC to fix wages, its rationale in arriving at the previous wage structure cannot pass without some scathing remarks. This is because, the very reasons it is offering for the cut have always been there. What had been lacking was a proper understanding of the situation when the previous bloated regime was being approved. Fluctuations in oil price are nothing new as our governments have had to contend with them overtime. Also the changes in patterns of oil production and serious efforts of some advanced countries to find alternatives have never ceased.  So at the time the previous structure was being worked out, such realities should not have escaped a serious regulatory body. After all, in each of our yearly budgets, such changes are usually anticipated and provided for in terms of lower benchmarks. In other words, it is not enough for the commission to raise its hands up with the impression that the fluctuations in oil prices were beyond it when it was fixing the previous regime. If it failed to anticipate such changes, it has itself to blame.

    That such remunerations are being reviewed now is an admission that something was not got right by the commission in its previous undertaking. The current downturn of the economy consequent upon the fall of oil in the international market could be a factor. Persistent outcry from the larger public on what is generally regarded as the outlandish pay of law makers when considered against the living conditions of our people is cited as another reason.

    There is also the body language of the current administration that appears not to admit of financial wastages as another possible reason why the commission had to hasten action in this regard so as not to incur the wrath of the powers that be. All these may have combined in facilitating the new pay regime. The rationale is that the monies that would be saved from the cut would be meaningfully deployed to other sectors of the economy to catalyze development. You cannot fault such an argument, it would seem.

    It is one thing to come out with a reduced pay package for public officers but a different kettle of fish for whatever savings that will accrue from it to make substantial difference in the total funds available to the government. You may well find out that such cuts will have the net effect of further impoverishing the lawmakers and thereby laying them susceptible to dipping their hands into public funds. It is better you are not exposed to good living than after being exposed to good life, the source of sustaining it is suddenly cut off. That may turn out as the unintended outcome of the coming reduction. That is the main issue to watch.

    But then, the salaries and allowances of the lawmakers and other public officers are not the real sources of the wealth some of them are known to be parading about. Much of the illegal monies they make come from unseen sources. And from those unseen sources, a lot of monies do change hands. A lot of smart stealing has been going on in the exercise of oversight functions and may continue unless adequate measures are taken to police such areas. That is in part why you hear of the scramble for juicy committee positions and other strategic assignments. There is nothing juicy about any position except the high prospects they offer for stealing. So we may be arming the legislators to resort to self- help if we come out with a regime of remunerations that they can barely survive on.

    With the wage reduction and plugging of all loopholes for stealing public funds, we may have gone to great lengths to chart a new course for probity and accountability in public offices. But that is not all. We are yet to find answers to the huge security votes at the beckon and call of presidents and governors. Much of the drain in our public coffers is recorded in this area. It is not surprising the high number of former governors that are facing serious charges of financial impropriety. Armed with immunity, they line their insatiable pockets until they are full to the brim. The kind of funds associated with former governors in and out of office has become a serious scandal. Something urgent must be done about the way governors use security votes.

    These are the real issues to worry about. So what difference does any cut in the salaries and allowances of a governor make when he can from under his table spend billions of Naira without a hoot. There may have been some cogent reasons for providing for such votes. But in our own circumstance, such reasons are often exploited for very self-serving ends.

    More importantly, something must be done about the prohibitive cost of running elections in this country. The financial demands on politicians during elections have to be checked. So if we succeed in making the lawmakers live within their means, something must be done to exorcise the idea of demanding money from them by the electorate before exercising their civic obligations. There has to be an overall attitudinal change for the new pay regime to serve its desired purpose.

  • NASS jumbo pay

    • The problem is not the basic salary but the magical allowances

    A pressure group, the Movement for Nigeria’s Total Transformation (MNTT), has perhaps raised the most profound query over National Assembly’s (NASS) hefty pay.

    “From 1999 to 2003, he earned N6million a year, from which he paid his aides,” MNTT quoted a South West senator, in the first senate of the present dispensation.  “What fortune has befallen Nigeria, that made N6 million a year for each senator, from 1999 to 2003, become N48 million a year, which is now N4 million a month, as disclosed by the RMAFC chairman?”

    The body, chaired by Chief Areoye Oyebola, former editor of the defunct Daily Times, was reacting to a claim by Elias Ebam, Chairman of the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), which constitutional role was to fix salaries and emoluments of political office holders.

    What has happened between 1999 and now — NASS has got more opaque and progressively brazen in helping itself to the common wealth it is constitutionally charged to guard and fairly appropriate? And RMAFC, progressively defanged, it could only wring its hands and point, near sotto voce, to an all-powerful culprit, NASS?

    To be fair, the public has been trenchant from the very beginning. But it would appear Nigerians could only bark, not bite. And horrors of horrors: by exclusively passing its own budget, and proceeding to share the pork among its members as it deemed fit, NASS is guilty of incestuous budgeting.

    That, indeed, does great violence to the doctrine of separation of powers; and its twin, checks-and-balances, on which presidentialism is anchored; and on which constitutionally robust platform NASS earned its over-sight function.

    It is therefore a condemnable case of wilful oversight, for NASS, by its opaque budgeting, to brazenly corner a mighty chunk of the common wealth, leaving the people, its electoral masters, to wallow in poverty. That is absolutely unacceptable.

    But even now, nobody appears sure of any fact — so near-impregnable is NASS’s fiscal opacity — beyond the jumbo yearly NASS budget of N150 billion, since 2010. Premium Times, an online newspaper claims, after an investigation, that the 360 members of the House of Representatives gross a yearly N6.58 billion, in salaries and allowances. The corresponding figure for the 109-member Senate is N2.14 billion.

    From the RMAFC, however, there is no definitive figure, not on the extant basic salary, not on allowances, only a plaintive moan from Mr. Ebam, that no NASS member should earn more than N1million a month, at the end of its current review. That certainly is not good enough. How could the RMAFC have been so remiss in its constitutional duty of over-seeing the pay of public office holders, elected and appointed?

    Mr. Ebam pleads poor funding; and argues RMAFC should be financially autonomous, by charging its funds to the Consolidated Revenue Fund. He also calls for power to enforce its recommendations. That is not unreasonable, though the call for charge into the Consolidated Fund smells like some fiscal empire building, which should not be necessary, had there been good faith all round. Anyway, whatever help RMAFC needs, to ensure sanity in public holders’ salaries, it should get.  But the practicability of any radical amendment to the extant law appears dim, since NASS would be crucial to the process, since its forte is law-making.

    Whatever it takes, the Buhari Presidency should do all it could to aid RMAFC right all the wrongs, in this lopsided salary scandal. NASS, for its public image and brand equity, should also cooperate. And if it doesn’t, the courts should weigh in to pronounce on any constitutional grey areas.

    In the final analysis, what to focus on is not the basic salaries, per se, but those magical allowances, which appear unconscionably loaded. More transparency in executive procedures would instantly cut out the  ever-recurring sleaze in legislative over-sight functions, which make many a legislator hanker after “juicy committees”. More on the executive: it must also drastically cut down on the perks of ministers and allied presidential appointees. It is no use roasting elected legislators, but letting presidential appointees wallow in their own unearned luxuries.

    Government is to serve but not to be served. The earlier this ethos is imbibed, the better Nigerian governments would maximally utilise scarce resources, ensure economic growth, and deliver development and ultimate prosperity.

  • Lawmakers and their jumbo pay

    Lawmakers and their jumbo pay

    Senators are under attack over the rejection of pay cut. Assistant Editor LEKE SALAUDEEN examines the implications of the senators’ decision on the nation’s economy and the  integrity of the National Assembly.

    Nigerians are angry with the senators for rejecting a pay cut as recommended by the Finance Committee of the National Assembly. Prominent opinion leaders expressed shock that the lawmakers are not bothered about the parlous state of the nation’s economy. They said the law makers insistence on the jumbo salaries, shows they are insensitive to the plight of average Nigerians who  have been short changed by those entrusted  with the commonwealth.

    The salaries and allowances of the National Assembly members have been subject of debate over the years. Many believe it was outrageous when compared to what their counterparts in other climes earn. Others argued that Nigerian economy can’t sustain it.  Though the basic salary of the National Assembly members is not in contest but the outrageous allowances they fixed for themselves. The mind bogging allowances include: Accommodation (Senator N4m, Rep N3.9m); Vehicle loan (Senator N8m, Rep N7.94m); Furniture (Senator N6m, Rep N5.9m); severance gratuity (Senator N6m, N5.9m).

    They also include motor vehicle fuelling and maintenance (Senator N1.5m, Rep N1.4m); constituency (Senator N5m, Rep N1.9m);  domestic staff (Senator N1.5m, Rep N1.4m) Personal Assistant  (Senator N506, 600, Rep N496, 303); Entertainment (Senator N607, 920, Rep N595, 563); recess (Senator N202, 640, Rep N198, 521); utilities (Senator N607, 920, Rep N397, 042); newspapers/periodicals (Senator N303, 960, Rep N297, 781), house maintenance (Senator N101, 320, RepN99, 260) and wardrobe (Senator N506, 600, Rep N496, 303). Other allowances are estacode (Senator $950, Rep $900) and duty tour allowance (Senator N37,000, Rep N35,000).

    Analysts said the eighth National Assembly largely dominated by members of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who rode to power on the vehicle of change, are insisting that the old order must be maintained. They explained that the change Nigerians want is the change that would rejuvenate the prostrate economy, the change that would revamp country’s battered image, the change that would rekindle ordinary Nigerians hope in the country and strengthen his resolve to work for and defend the country that must immediately begin with members of the National Assembly adding the change must be seen in their salaries and allowances.

    Irked by the Senators reaction, Second Republic law maker, Dr Junaid Muhammed castigated them for what he described as insensitivity to the general feelings of the populace to their opulent life style which is at variance with the economic situation in the country.

    Mohammed lamented that the 1979 and 1999 Constitutions made provisions for the members of National Assembly to fix their salaries and allowances. “It was a mistake that the 1979 and 1999 Constitutions empower the law makers to fix their salaries and allowances. In a normal society or a matured democracy, you don’t allow members of legislature to fix their salaries.

    “In a civilised and rational society, the nation pays the people including law makers, based on the content of the service rendered and what the nation’s economy can afford. There is no justification for the outrageous salaries and allowances fixed by them. When the economy nose dive, the normal thing to do is to cut down the expenses and plug all the leakages in the system so that the nation do not go bankrupt.

    “As a matter of policy, the salaries and allowances of the National Assembly members must relate to what is being paid to other workers in the economy in relation to what is obtained in advanced democracies like the United States of America, Britain, France, Germany and Canada among others. Paying Nigeria Senators salaries higher than what President Obama of US earns is senseless. The United States is the most powerful country and the largest economy in the world”.

    The Kano born politician said: “What I expect from the Senators is to set in motion the machinery for downward review of their salaries and allowances. Anything short of that will portray them as greedy people who care less about the well being of the country and the down trodden who bear the brunt of economic mismanagement and financial recklessness of the few who found themselves in leadership position”.

    The Executive Director, Conscience Nigeria, Mr Tosin Adeyanju, was upset by the senators reaction to pay cut. He recalled that in 2013, “the National Assembly allocation and budget was about N50 billion; by 2015, it has astronautically jumped to about N120 billion for just 469 people. This is not justifiable in a country that has over 180 million people, and in a nation that is in economic crises with huge dependence on oil revenue that has dipped by 50 per cent”

    The civil rights activist noted that Nigerian law makers were the highest paid in the world and demanded 60 per cent cut in their pay package. According to him, with a national minimum wage of N18,000 per month totalling N216,000 per annum, it will take an average Nigerian worker 60 years to earn the annual salary and allowances of a Nigerian Senator. This is not right and something urgent has to be done to slash the salaries and allowances of the law makers. The demand is imperative in view of the number of Nigerians living in poverty and the country’s revenue, he said.

    In the same vein, the former Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, Chief Emeka Anyaoku has called for  the downward review of the National Assembly Members pay. According to him, the Nigerian law makers were the highest paid law makers in the world. Nigerian lawmakers earn more than their counterparts in the United States, China, Britain, Japan and Canada, among others, he asserted.

    Constitutional lawyer Professor Itse Sagay (SAN) described the rejection of the pay cut by the senators as selfish. He said there has been so much talk about their allowances and one should ordinarily expect them to do something and succumb to the public demand. Instead, they have been consistent in their attitude of not being concerned about the interest of the country but their personal interests, he observed.

    Sagay noted that “there are six or seven items on their list of allowances that they should remove, for instance, the wardrobe allowance. As a man with wife and children, is it not an embarrassment for me to be waiting for government to clothe me?

    “Their actions are tantamount to exploiting and squeezing blood out of the nation. I think we have to decide whether our National Assembly should work on part-time and paid allowances based on the number of times they sit as it was the case during the First Republic. The allowances they are collecting are unrealistic in a developing country like Nigeria. If we cannot iron it out now, we can embark on it in the next dispensation. It should be a campaign issue in the next election.”

    Stressing the need for a 60 per cent wage cut for the law makers, Adeyanju said: “We need to save Nigeria from imminent collapse in order not to turn it into another Greece. Political position must be made less attractive; the country needs a unicameral and not bicameral legislation”.

    Following the 50 per cent pay cut announced by President Muhammadu Buhari for himself, the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, and the presidential aides, the expectation of many Nigerians was that the National Assembly members would follow suit. Public Affairs analyst Dr Alex Otitoloju said it was disheartening to hear the Senators seeking to maintain the status quo.

    Otitoloju said this attitude surely portrays the law makers as not being on the same page with the president. It is very dangerous to the overall wellbeing of the country, especially the President’s commitment towards resuscitating the economy. Any member of the National Assembly that fails to follow the good example demonstrated by President Buhari is peoples’ enemy and should be treated as a saboteur.

    He was disturbed by the reports that the APC law makers in the National Assembly are resisting the change mantra of the Buhari administration and insisting that the older must be maintained.  He faulted the argument of the law makers that they use part of their allowances to empower members of their constituencies. “Law makers are not father Xmas. They are not elected to dole out money to their constituents; they are expected to offer quality representation, make laws for good governance and facilitate developmental projects to their constituencies.

    “The law makers cannot afford not to be part of or even lead the change that would guaranty quality standard of living for the poor and abandoned ordinary citizens of the country who have over the years being the victims of the tiny but powerful people who have continued to misrule the country.”

    Former Chairman of the Nigeria Bar Association,(NBA) Mr  Monday Ubani was furious over what he described as fabulous salaries and allowances being drawn by the law makers for doing nothing. He noted that each senator has collected N36.4 million and House of Rep member N17m as housing furniture and transport allowances. In the past two and half months, these law makers have not passed a single law, yet the nation had to expend almost N13 billion for their personal comfort.

    “How would you expect such people to accept pay cut? They are very selfish; they are not interested in the well being of the nation and the people. They did not work for one week, they have collected colossal sum of money for doing nothing. The total cost on legislative is alarming; it constitutes a drain pipe on the nation’s economy. It is a big mistake that the constitution allows the law makers to fix their salaries and allowances.”

    Ubani suggested that there should be an arrangement to make the National Assembly and other elective positions less attractive to maintain modesty in salaries and allowances. “We have states that cannot pay salaries and the law makers in the National Assembly want to live fat at the expense of the masses. I believe time will sort everything out”, he added.