Lawmakers discuss bill to grant National Assembly's principal officers life pensions

MEMBERS of Nigeria's National Assembly have begun debating a controversial bill that grant life pensions to its presiding officers like the senate president and the speaker of the House of Representatives among others.

Nigerian lawmakers are among the highest paid in the world, which causes a great deal of consternation across the country.  Given that Nigeria has the highest number of people living in absolute poverty on the planet, the fact that the National Assembly gulps 3% of the nation's annual budget is seen as a travesty.

Civil society groups are thus outraged at the latest development, which will grant life pensions to the senate president, House speaker and both their deputies. Proposals to offer them this retirement package were contained in the National Assembly’s Joint Special Ad Hoc Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution which submitted its report containing 68 recommendations in the respective chambers yesterday.

Recommendation 16 reads: “That the House does receive the report of the Special Ad hoc Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution on a Bill for an Act to Alter the Provisions of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 to Provide Pension for Presiding Officers of the National Assembly; and for Related Matters.”

Already Section 84(5) of the Nigerian constitution guarantees life pension for all former presidents and vice presidents, a cost which gulps an average of N7.8bn yearly. This provision reads: “Any person who has held office as president or vice president shall be entitled to pension for life at a rate equivalent to the annual salary of the incumbent president or vice president, provided that such a person was not removed from office by the process of impeachment or for breach of any provisions of this constitution.”

Kola Dare, the deputy director of the Socio Economic Rights and Accountability Project (Serap), called on Nigerians to ask their various representatives at the National Assembly to kick against such provisions. He added that it was selfish of them to have considered such a provision in the first place.

Mr Dare said: “The proposed amendment if that is true, cannot be said to be in the interest of Nigeria. Serap is in court challenging the payment of life pensions to some governors and deputy governors in their states.

“That of the National Assembly is at best a waste of public resource and the money could be put to better use. Our education sector is there and our health sector is not getting the best of funding, so that proposed amendment should not be allowed to stand. Nigerians should reach out to their representatives at the National Assembly to vote against the amendment.”