Senator Sumaila Kawu (APC, Kano South) has revealed the mystery surrounding legislative pay in Nigeria, telling a BBC reporter that he earns over ₦21m monthly as a total take-home package.
The official pay of ₦1 million fixed by the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) drops to around ₦600,000 after deductions. Still.
This admission comes barely a day after RMAFC Chairman Mohammed Shehu disclosed that each of the 109 senators in the upper chamber receives a total of ₦1.06m in salary and allowances per month, forcing Kawu to clarify.
Kawu said the monthly salary is less than ₦1 million, but deductions often bring it down to about ₦600,000. Furthermore, he revealed that besides the salary, each senator is given ₦21 million monthly as the cost of running his office, including newspaper money, local travel, and others.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo had reignited the controversy when he recently tackled National Assembly members who paid him a courtesy visit. Led by Ikenga Ugochinyere (PDP, Ideato North) in the House of Representatives, the former president described legislators’ humongous salaries as “immoral.”
Nigerians have been demanding a reduction in the cost of governance in favor of pro-poor expenditures and to fund the economy’s productive sector.
The high cost of governance partly led to the unrest of the #EndBadGovernance protests in the country earlier in the month.
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 discloses that Nigerian senators earn over ₦21 million monthly, sparking controversy over legislative pay. The revelation follows recent RMAFC's statement on official salaries.){kind=link}