Political office holders, including President Umaru Yar’Adua and Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan, earn a whopping N1.13tn annually as salaries and allowances.

The figure, contained in a document by the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission, is only 39 per cent lower than the N2.9tn budget for 2009 sent to the National Assembly by Yar’Adua for approval.

The copies of the document titled “Affordability and Cost Implications of the Reviewed Renumeration Package” were attached to the letter that the commission got from Yar’Adua on the proposed pay cut.

The copies of the document were distributed to the RMAFC commsissioners who on Thursday began deliberations on the President’s proposed reduction in salaries and allowances of political office holders.

The President had on Tuesday said he would write the commission to slash the salaries and allowances of all political office holders in view of the nation’s declining revenue caused by global financial meltdown.

The emoluments scale-down affects public officers and political appointees in the Federal, State and Local Government levels; and it involves a huge N1.126trn, paid out annually, according to the document.

The RMAFC document had justified the existing N1.126trn emoluments and its affordability, when it was prepared in 2008.

Details of what each of the three tiers of government collects is as follows: “N173bn(federal), N360bn(states) and N592bn (Local Government respectively).”

The salaries and allowances, which were approved in April 2008, provoked a national debate on the rationale amid increasing mass poverty.

But the RMAFC had argued that the increase was based on the depreciation in value of the salaries of the affected officers and what it considered as “progress registered in the economy in recent years,” which had seen real Gross Domestic Product accelerate.

Before the hike, public office holders’ emoluments had grossed about N751bn per annum, including the N9.9bn used in settling emoluments of Federal judicial officers and N288bn for Local Government legislatures.

For Federal, State and Local Government, pre-April 2008 packages for public officers stood at N115bn, 240bn and 395bn respectively.

The RMAFC emergency meeting took place at the commission’s headquarters with most of its 27 Commissioners in attendance.

Yar’Adua, in his letter read by the Commission’s Chairman in charge of Business Session, Gen. Obala, stated that, “Our country has become a victim, like all other countries, of the current global financial meltdown.

“This can only be mitigated through a responsive review of recurrent costs to maintain the momentum of our development.”

The President noted that decline in oil sales and shrinking foreign inflow of investments were serious concerns, which needed redemptive measures.

The Chairman of the RMAFC , Alhaji Mamman Tukur, who described the task before his commission as“very complex”, declined comments on the time- frame for the completion of the assignment.

He said, “We are looking at market conditions, Gross Domestic Product and inflation. The President is in charge of everybody. He has seen that the economy cannot take it (current pay size).

“The effect of this letter (Yar’Adua’s) has a very wide implication.”

He added that the commission’s proposals were recommendations that the Federal Government would forward to lawmakers in the federal, state and local government level for approval.

By the statutory nature of RMAFC’s assignment, Turkur said that their recommendations would not be jettisoned by any legislature, stressing that lawmakers were constitutionally barred from fixing their salaries and allowances.

“They can only reduce but not add,” he explained.

The 1999 Constitution in its Third Schedule 32 (d) empowers only RMAFC to, “determine the remuneration appropriate for political office holders including the President, Vice-President, Governors, Deputy Governors, Ministers Commissioners, Special Advisers, Legislators and the holders of the offices in Section 84 and 124.”

As at April last year, the country had 17,474 political and public office holders, of which 8,692 represented lawmakers in Local Government Legislature. The Executives in the councils were 3,096.

Others include state Judiciary 792, state Legislature 1,152, Federal Judiciary 142, Federal Legislature 464 and Federal Executive 472.

It could not be ascertained as at 9pm on Thursday if the figure had increased.

Meanwhile, the salary cut being proposed by Yar’Adua is unlikely to receive the endorsement of the members of the National Assembly.

Our correspondents gathered in Abuja on Thursday that Senators had since the President’s announcement of the plan adopted an attitude of “let’s wait and see.”

There is no indication yet that the Senate leadership is contemplating emulating the example of the President.

Although opinions, for now, appear divided over the issue, the implication of the proposal has generated considerable interest among legislators.

But the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Media and Publicity, Senator Ayogu Eze, however dismissed such insinuations. He said “I am not aware of any such thing.”

bayemibo:

The figure, contained in a document by the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission, is only 39 per cent lower than the N2.9tn budget for 2009 sent to the National Assembly by Yar’Adua for approval.

       

Are you surprised? Why do you think they kill, maim and do all forms of corruption to get that position? Why do you think political godfathers, both serving and retired, must make sure it's only their loyalists that get there? My brother, we are supposed to weep for our country. It is rotten .

Where do they get the money?

jamace:

Are you surprised? Why do you think they kill, maim and do all forms of corruption to get that position? Why do you think political godfathers, both serving and retired, must make sure it's only their loyalists that get there? My brother, we are supposed to weep for our country. It is rotten .

So they basically get paid approximately 61% of money allocated to about 150 million people. OH MY GOD. What a country?

[center]Rotten is an understatement in describing the state of Nigeria.[/center]

How many thousands of political officers are we speaking of here? About half of the yearly budget goes to paying the politicians in that country?

did you guys just know about these figures? house of rep member dey collect some N1.4M, senate dey collect about N2.4M PER MONTH!

Unbeweavable!!!

Nigeria the failed state