The Senate, Tuesday, said it would soon release “accurate figures” of its expenditure, saying it has nothing to hide.
This comes a day after House of Representatives spokesman, Zakari Mohammed, refuted claims that lawmakers in the National Assembly were the highest paid lawmakers in the world.
[READ: Giants of the world: Our lawmakers earn 116 times more than the average Nigerian]
[READ: N1.5 million to fuel a car?: See what your Senators and Reps ‘officially’ earn]
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, Senator Ahmad Maccido (PDP, Sokoto North), said he would go through the records and come up with authentic figures of amounts released and expended so far.
Maccido, in a short text message to Vanguard, in Abuja, seeking his reaction to Monday’s statement by former Minister of Education, Mrs. Oby Ezekwesili that Nigeria had so far spent more than N1 trillion on the maintenance of National Assembly in the past eight years, said the Senate was not prepared to join issues with her.
[READ: N1 trillion spent on National Assembly members in 8 years – Oby Ezekwesili]
He said the upper legislative chamber had nothing to hide, saying it had been transparent in the course of its functions. Maccido also insisted that appropriate figure on money released to the Senate would in no time be made available.
In his words, “It needs some time to go through records and come up with accurate figure and at the moment I am not in Abuja.”
The former Minister of Education had reignited the conversation over lawmakers’ pay with her allegation that a mind boggling N1 trillion had not only been spent on the maintenance of members of the National Assembly but also N9.08 billion on managing the presidential fleet alone.
Mrs Ezekwesili, who is a former Vice-President of the World Bank (Africa Division), had equally blasted the budgetary allocation system in the country, which prioritises recurrent expenditure over capital projects – a position she has strenuously held in the past.
[Photo H/T: YNaija]