IT emerged at the weekend that no fewer than six agencies attached to the National Assembly are beneficiaries of the billions allocated to the National Assembly annually through the national budget.
The agencies include the two chambers of the National Assembly, the National Assembly Service Commission (NASC), the National Institute of Legislative Studies (NILS), the National Assembly management, National Assembly Budget and Research Office (NABRO) and international parliamentary associations.
Contrary to indications that the bulk of the N120 billion allocated to the Assembly from the national budget in 2015 is to be shared between the Senate and the House of Representatives, the budget is actually dissipated among the different subheads.
Sources in the legislature said that the lawmakers are already groaning as a result of the slash in the budget of the legislature from N150 billion in 2014 to N130 billion in 2015.
Some activities of the legislature, including conferences and international travels, are already being slashed and the number of delegates are also being reused on important parliamentary delegations.
No fewer than 8,000 individuals from the several subheads draw salaries from the National Assembly coffers, including 109 senators and 360 members of the House of Representatives, 13 commissioners of the NASC, 3,208 staff of the commission, at least 337 members of the NASS management, including the Clerk to the National Assembly, who is equivalent of a Permanent a Secretary, 3,024 legislative aides attached to senators and members of the House of Representatives, seven board members of the members of NILS, which is headed by a director and has at least 115 staff.
Besides, the standing committees of the Senate and the House, which are run like ministries at the executive arm of government, are also allocated funds from the budget.
The 54 Standing Committees of the Senate and the 91 Standing Committees of the House of Representatives were allocated funds on a quarterly basis, up to 2014 when paucity of funds forced the Federal Government to vary the quarterly allocations, which were sometimes paid on a monthly basis.
At least each of the Public Hearings organized by the Standing Committees gulp about N2 million at every instance, outside the tours and oversight functions.
The National Assembly is also committed to remitting its membership fees to organisations including the Inter-Parliamentary Union, Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, Pan African Parliament, ECOWAS Parliament, African, Caribbean and Pacific-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly, Shoora/Arab Parliament and National Conference of State Legislatures.
The salaries and allowances of the legislators are fixed by the Revenue Mobilization, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC).
According to records, the monthly salary of a senator stands at N1.4 million while the member in the lower House gets N1.1 million a month. Details of the salary include wardrobe allowance of N42,216 and N41,358 for Senator and Representative respectively, N337, 733 and N330,868 for Housing Allowance. Other components of the monthly salary include basic salary (N168, 866 for Senators and N165,435 for reps), vehicle maintenance (N126,650 and N124,075) for as entire and Reps respectively, while other additions include entertainment, utility, domestic staff, constituency, newspaper, recess and personal assistant.
The Federal Government in 2008 agreed to allocate the sum of N100 billion annually for constituency projects of members of the National Assembly. But the funds are never allocated to each senator or Rep member as erroneously indicated.
The lawmakers are allowed to indicate projects equivalent to that sum in the ministries and parastatals of their choice, while the respective Ministries, Departments and Agencies are to executive the projects.
Said a source in the know: “Contrary to the belief that the annual budget of the National Assembly are carted home by the 109 Senators and 360 members, there are about 4,000 individuals, 145 committees, nine local and foreign bodies as well as four agencies which share the N120 billion allocated to the federal legislature as indicated in the 2015 budget.”
The funds allocated to the legislature are also spent on some capital projects, including general services and maintenance of the National Assembly complex, litigations, hiring consultants, performing oversight functions as well as local and foreign travels.
Records in the Ministry of Finance and the National Assembly showed that the funds allocated to the National Assembly is less than 3 percent of the nation’s N4.5 trillion budget.
A source further said : “Members of the National Assembly are neither given funds to execute projects in their constituencies nor do they prequalify Contractors for such projects. The practice is that, some relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies of the executive arm of government allowed members of the National Assembly to indicate where certain projects should be sited in their constituencies.”
The procurement processes as well as funding for these projects remains an executive function.”
A number of Senators and Rep members who defended the financial situation of the National Assembly said that the cut in the budget was already having anger tube impact on the lawmakers.
One of them said: “recall that the Senators and Representatives are the agencies for social security in this country. Without any statutory social security programme, our constituents besiege our home and offices for one financial assistance or the other. So, people who bandied about exaggerated figures about our allowances should know they are simply undermining democracy.
“People who are talking about jumbo salary figures for the National Assembly are simply trying to turn the people against us. Those figures are not correct. They are not enough to even provide the comfort that some of us enjoy before coming to the National Assembly.”
A major source of contention however remains what of often referred to as the jumbo pay of the lawmakers.
Some sources have quoted different figures to indicate that the Nigerian legislature are the highest paid in the world.
Investigations however showed that the lawmakers are entitled to office running costs, which are in line with the standards of the Federal Government.
