Nigerian Senators reject reduction of salaries and allowances

 The Senate on Wednesday suspended
consideration of the report of its Finance
committee following sharp disagreements among
members over the pay cut recommended by the
panel.
 Punch learnt that the senators during a two-hour
deliberation behind closed doors, resolved to
reject the reduction of salaries and allowances as
recommended by the Senator James Manager’s
committee.
The senators, according to one of them who
confided in our correspondent, said it was not
possible to accept pay cut with other beneficiaries
of the N120bn National a$$embly annual budget
not doing same.The senator said that his
colleagues accordingly resolved to reject the
report because the recommendations were not
practicable.
Some other senators who also spoke to The
PUNCH on condition of anonymity said further
consideration of the finance committee report
was stepped down because many of their
colleagues rejected the contents of the report.
On what transpired at the closed- door session,
Senator Matthew Urhoghide (PDP Edo South), said
senators told themselves the truth at the session
on the need to be very cautious on accepting
reduction of salaries and allowances.
Urhoghide said that majority of the senators
agreed that “funny allowances” like the monthly
N42,000 wardrobe allowance should be cut off
completely.
He said, “Yes, as recommended by the
committee, all senators agreed that there must
be openness in Senate budget and by extension,
that of the National a$$embly.“At the same time,
many reasoned that why should we further
reduce our budget when already, N30bn has been
reduced from the traditional 150bn that it used
to be for all the seven different organs of the
National a$$embly. “All of us have people in our
constituencies and financial requests from them
keep piling up on a daily basis, the reality of
which made steps to be redirected, otherwise,
some of us may stop coming here.”
The committee, it was learnt, also recommended
the publication of all the payments accruable to
each senator on a quarterly basis