• Lawmakers’ allowances will be published – Speaker
As the management of the National Assembly is stepping up over allocation of offices to the 469 federal lawmakers ahead of their resumption next week, investigations indicated that N9billion has been set aside for them as wardrobe allowance. This is aside from other allowances like furniture, housing, vehicle and others.
This is just as the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, yesterday, said the salary and allowances of members of the House of Representatives may soon be made public.
Newswatch Times investigations showed that the N9billion for wardrobe allowance for members of the 8th National Assembly, which may be paid into their individual bank accounts latest by next week, is N17.5 million for each of the 360 members of the House of Representatives and N 21.5 million for each of the 109 Senators.
Housing allowance for the political office holders is 200 per cent of their annual salaries, while furniture is 300 per cent and motor vehicle loan is 400 per cent.
Specifically, 107 senators, aside the Senate President, are to be paid N4,052,800 as housing allowance. They will also be paid the same amount every year because the housing allowance is on annual basis.
This means that 107 senators will be paid a total of N433, 649,600 as housing allowance annually since both the Senate President and the Deputy Senate President are provided accommodation by the Federal Government.
Similarly, each member of the House of Representatives will be paid N3, 970,425 as housing allowance on assumption of office.
This means that the 358 House of Representatives members will collect a total of N1, 421,412,150 as housing allowance.
Again, the Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives are excluded from this allowance as the Federal Government is to provide their own accommodation.
It would be recalled that following the monetisation of entitlements of public officials, the lawmakers lost the right to occupy houses built and maintained by the government.
Consequently, the Federal Government sold the houses previously occupied by the lawmakers to them.
The principal officers of the National Assembly also benefited from the sale of the houses. As a result, the Federal Capital Territory Administration is at present building new houses for occupiers of the four presiding offices at both chambers; they are: Senate President, the Deputy Senate President, the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker.
For furniture, each of the senators is to get N6, 079,200. The furniture for both the Senate President and his deputy are to be fully provided by the government. This means that 107 senators will get a total of N650, 474,400 as furniture allowance. Furniture allowance is paid once in four years.
Each member of the House of Representatives will be paid N5, 955,637.50 as furniture allowance. This means that 358 House member (excluding the speaker and his deputy) will collect a total of N2, 132,118,225 for furniture.
For vehicle, each of the senators is entitled to N8, 105,600, while each House of Representatives member is entitled to N7, 940,850.50. This means that 107 senators will collect N867, 299,200 for vehicles, while 358 House member will collect N2, 842,824,479 for the same purpose.
However, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, yesterday, said the salary and allowances of members of the House of Representatives may soon be made public.
Dogara, who disclosed this yesterday while addressing the visit of a delegation of civil society groups under the auspices of “Civil Society Situation Room,” in Abuja, pledged to run an open door policy by making the salaries and allowances of lawmakers open for public debate.
According to him, “The issue of transparency in the finances of the National Assembly has been a subject of bitter exchange between the National Assembly and CSOs.”
He said, “This time around, we will put it on the front burner regarding the issue of wages, salaries, allowances and the working of the parliament. It is an issue that has generated a lot of heat and we must open it up and engage CSOs.
“For instance, we are going to engage you on ideas about how much should a public hearing require to be aired live.”
Dogara asked, “If we are unable to open up the process of lawmaking, can it be truly called an effective parliament?”
He added: “You provide serious vigilance against tyranny and brazen impunity whether from the political class or from public and private individuals.
“Some think of you as meddle-some interlopers and I don’t think so. And I must say that you have done very well. In some cases, your participation has been termed as a noisy one, but the conflict of ideas and exchange must be seen to be noisy if valid argument must be made.
“Given your roles as watchdogs, we had a peaceful and credible election which was highly acclaimed by all stakeholders. We owe you a debt of gratitude.”
He said, however, “we have lots of overheads with agencies under the National Assembly which draw funding from our purse; which was N150billion and now N120billion. But even at that, we will open it up.”
Earlier, the convener of the group, Dr. Clement Nwankwo, had stated that they were at the House to congratulate the Speaker on his electoral victory and to declare total support for the new leadership while expecting maximum performance through effective collaboration.
“We do realise that your election into this position was a hard fought battle. We watched closely the contest and we are delighted that a well experienced lawyer and lawmaker like you was elected.
“Some of us here have worked with you in previous assignments and we know that you have a huge capacity to deliver on your mandate as speaker,” Nwankwo said.
He said there are areas of priority which the civil society was at the House to advocate for and they bother on certain important Bills which are considered pending from the precious Assembly and requiring urgent legislative attention.
“There are priority Bills that we are interested in to be passed in the next 12 months. One of our biggest disappointments was seeing the National Assembly pass 46 bills in 10 minutes.
“Among the priority bills are: Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), constitution amendment Bill, Electoral Act amendment Bill (2014).
“We hope that these bills will be looked into and passed so that the President can sign them into law as quickly as possible,” he said.
The Civil Society Situation Room is a congregation of Non-Government Organisations in Nigeria made up of over 60 civil society groups focusing on different areas of human endeavours.
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