No to NASS members’ over-bloated aides

It is very disturbing that the country’s incoming 469-member National Assembly is reportedly contemplating employing 2,445 legislative aides in a period of “formidable economic challenges principally arising from precipitous decline in oil prices”; at a time when revenues available to the federal and state governments continue to drop, leaving virtually all the states incapable of meeting their financial obligations, including payment of workers’ salaries.

According to reports, each federal lawmaker will have five aides, while each of the 20 principal officers of both chambers of the National Assembly (the Senate and House of Representatives) will have five additional aides, making a total of 10 aides for each principal officer. These include senior legislative aides, legislative aides, secretary, personal assistant and legislative assistant, while the additional aides for principal officers include special advisers, senior special assistants, special assistants, media relations officers and protocol officers. Senior legislative aides are on Salary Grade Level 14 to 16, legislative aides are on SGL 10 to 12, while secretary, personal assistant and legislative assistant are on SGL 7-8, SGL 8, and SGL 9, respectively.

This plan by the National Assembly in these perilous times, to put it mildly, is the height of insensitivity to the economic realities of the times and to the plight of Nigerians. Just on Tuesday, BusinessDay reported that the Federation Account Allocation Committee last Friday distributed N388 billion as revenue for the month of April 2015, which is 11 percent lower than the previous month and about 50 percent lower than a one-year peak distribution in June 2014.

Over the years, watchers of the Nigerian economy have relentlessly raised alarms that huge cost of governance in the country, if not tackled headlong, would soon bring the economy to its knees. The alarms have grown louder recently given the prevailing economic conditions. One area that commentators have often pointed to, and justifiably, is the National Assembly.

Indeed, the budgets for the federal legislature over the years have been a drain on the economy. For example, in the four years of President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, the National Assembly has been allocated N600 billion, representing N150 billion per annum. This amount, observers say, covers the capital votes of 20 ministries, departments and agencies, and represents 3.4 percent of the country’s total budget. This wastage, for us, must be stopped forthwith beginning with cutting down the size of the lawmakers’ aides.

This is why we agree with Olisa Agbakoba, a senior advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and a former president of the Nigerian Bar Association, who challenged the incoming Muhammadu Buhari administration to show his seriousness in the war against corruption by first of all tackling the unconstitutional salary payment of members of the National Assembly.

According to Agbakoba in a recent interview, “The Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) sets salaries, but the National Assembly refused to follow it. You remember when El-Rufai accused them of earning huge sums of money, the same with former governor of the Central Bank, Sanusi. They are getting large sums of money; they consume about 25 percent of the total annual budget of the country. Why wouldn’t I want to go to the National Assembly if being a member of the House of Representatives I can get N600 million a year? … Some of them in the other side of the National Assembly get as much as N1 billion a year. So, the motivation is not to go and pass laws, they go there because of the money they make; that’s why they perform below average.”

Similarly, we agree with Emeka Ononamadu, executive director, Citizens Centre for Integrated Development and Social Rights, that serious-minded lawmakers who mean well for the country must lead the way in the effort for the reduction of cost of governance.

“Even without the drop in oil price, the campaign and advocacy for reduction of cost of governance had been there because we believe that Nigeria is suffering from infrastructural decay that is almost at opposite direction with the kind of resources we generate on a yearly basis …. This is a new dawn and even if the oil price hits $200 per barrel, it is unreasonable for us to maintain high cost of governance. In America and other countries that are 20 times richer than Nigeria, they don’t run costs the way we do,” Ononamadu said.

In our view, the change that is permeating the length and breadth of the country must transcend a mere change of party baton. Old ways of doing things must begin to give way to the new. And the National Assembly must change with the times.