The House of Representatives has accepted the challenge by a former Minister of Education, Oby Ezekwesili, to conduct a public hearing on its alleged scandalous N1 trillion wage bill since 2005.
A spokesperson for the House said in a statement on Thursday that the National Assembly “wholeheartedly” welcomed Mrs. Ezekwesili’s request because of its belief in transparency in governance.
A statement by Rep Victor Afam-Ogene, Deputy Chairman, House Committee on Public Affairs, however said the former minister should prepare to explain her understanding of cost of governance and provide reasons for narrowing the concept to the National Assembly, leaving out the Executive.
The statement reads, “Nigerians would remember that in the course of a similar misadventure in January 2013, Mrs. Ezekwesili had made wild claims bordering on the alleged frittering of $45bn of the country’s external reserves, and $22bn in the excess crude account.
“While she has yet to fully justify those allegations, the former minister is this time seeking a fresh sparring partner in the Legislature.
“If it were not so, why would an address which centered on a “Cost of Governance in NIgeria” be curiously limited to an inquest into the operations of the National Assembly, leaving out the other two arms of government (the Executive and Judiciary) and arriving at the rather simplistic suggestion of the introduction of a unicameral or part-time legislature as the panacea for all Nigeria’s problems?
“Since it is public knowledge that whosoever wishes to go to equity ought to do so with clean hands, we restate our earlier posers which Mrs. Ezekwesili conveniently glossed over in her latest statement on this issue, to wit: What is the percentage of the National Assembly’s N150bn allocation in a budget of N4.9tr?
“Is it right to insinuate that the budgetary allocation for the National Assembly is for ‘members salaries and allowances’, while deliberately leaving out capital projects component, salaries of legislative aides and the bureaucracy, as well as allied institutions such as the Institute for Legislative Studies?
“What is the total disbursement to the Executive and the Judicial arms of government over the same eight-year period?
“For an ex-official of government, who between the 2006 and 2007 federal budgets, superintended over a total of N422.5bn as Education Minister, what percentage of the public fund was expended by her as recurrent cost?”
Mrs Ezekwesili, had on Wednesday challenged the federal lawmakers to a public hearing, where she indicated she would defend her call for the scrapping of an arm of the National Assembly which, as presently structured, has gulped over N1 trillion in federal budget since 2005.
Mrs. Ezekwesili’s earlier call on Monday had stirred a fresh debate about government spending on salaries.
Speaking at an event hosted by the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre that day, Mrs. Ezekwesili said Nigeria’s 469-member National Assembly, comprising a Senate and a House of Representatives, had gulped N1 trillion since 2005.
She criticized the lawmakers’ huge wage bill as well as Nigeria’s budgets that have given more money to recurrent expenditure, and called for a single arm of the legislature.
As expected, the comments sparked angry reactions from lawmakers on Tuesday, who asked the minister to also shed light on how much she spent or drew first as a minister of solid minerals, and later as minister of education.
Mrs. Ezekwesili was first appointed a minister of solid minerals in 2005, under former President Olusegun Obasanjo. She was later moved to the education ministry.
“She was part of several reform committees that ended up being reformed themselves. In view of this, the best way to go to equity is to go with clean hands,” a spokesperson for the House of Representatives, Victor Ogene, said.
“It would, however, suffice for Ezekwesili to tell us what recurrent expenditure was during her tenure and what it cost Nigerian taxpayers to maintain her and her aides for a year.”
Mrs. Ezekwesili, also a former World Bank executive, fired back in a statement on Wednesday, challenging the lawmakers to contest her figures, and set a day for a public hearing where the issues of their scandalous pay would be taken up.
“The NASS in its prestige as the most important symbol of our democracy has a duty to promote at all times the democratic culture of tolerance for dissension. Would it therefore not have been more dignifying of our democracy if the spokesmen had used the opportunity of their reaction to offer their own data to contradict or clarify anything conveyed in my speech after reading it?” she asked.
The minister then asked for date, and pledged to be available for the hearing that would discuss lawmakers’ remuneration.
“I wish to state with absolute respect for our lawmakers and our institution that it will be more valuable and enriching for our democracy if instead of the abusive language of their recent reaction, the NASS immediately offered me and the rest of the Nigerian public, the opportunity of a Public Hearing on their Budgetary Allocation and the very relevant issue of their remuneration,” she said.
“I shall make myself available to the NASS as soon as it decides to host a Public Hearing on this and other related issues of the lawmakers’ interest.”
Nigerian lawmakers are rated as the world’s highest paid, with approved salaries and allowances over N30 million annually. In addition, they also receive huge quarterly allowance, widely known by Nigerians as “jumbo pay” but tagged “running cost” by the lawmakers.
But while much of the legislators’ earnings are known to the public and often come under criticism, lawmakers accuse the executive, comprising the president and his cabinet of earning far ahead of them and spending public funds unchecked.
The ministers are also accused of pocketing billions of naira in internally generated revenues, and refusing to remit them to government coffers.
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