•New pay structure coming for public
officers
The Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal
Commission (RMAFC) is unaware of lawmakers’
jumbo pay.
Its Chairman Elias Mbam said yesterday that no
senator or House of Representatives member
should earn more than N1m monthly, going by
the recommendations of the commission,
which fixes salaries and wages for public
officers.
Mbam spoke to reporters at the State House in
Abuja after a meeting of the RMAFC with
President Muhammadu Buhari.
According to him, a new pay structure that will
reflect the economic realities will be proposed
next month for all categories of public officers.
Although President Buhari and Vice President
Yemi Osinbajo have slashed their salaries by 50
per cent, federal lawmakers have expressed
disinterest in cutting their pay.
But Mbam told reporters yesterday that if the
lawmakers’ salaries are cut by the RMAFC after
the review, they must abide by the decision.
“They do not have a choice; we are guided by
the Constitution and we are going to be guided
by such laws that are provided for in the
Constitution and the oath they swore to obey
the laws of the country.
“We are currently reviewing the subsisting
remuneration packages and it is going to reflect
the socio-economic realities of today.
On when a new package will be ready, Mbam
said: “We expect that before the end of next
month it will be ready. But it will go through a
process. It is not something that you will just
say ‘yes’ or ‘no’. It will go through a process and
it should be obvious to you the economic
realities of the day and it is going to reflect
that.
“Recently, the oil price dropped. Many
government agencies, the states and local
governments have not been able to pay their
salaries. These are some of the issues that
made it necessary to review it.
“It did not start with this administration; we
started the review as far back as last year. It is
not because of the present administration that
we commenced it.”
He spoke of the President’s advice “to ensure
that we use all legitimate means to make all
public office holders take home the
remuneration as determined by the
Commission and ensure that leakages are
blocked and we try to expand the size of the
cake”.
On revenue sharing formula, Mbam said a draft
copy is ready but needed the approval of
several authorities before a final copy is
released.
“I do not want to give a definite date because it
is beyond my control. I do not determine when
the process will be concluded but as far as the
Commission is concerned, we have concluded
our work and announced to the general public
that we have a draft.
“But you know it goes through a process before
it finally becomes a law,” he said
A statement by the President’s Senior Special
Assistant on (Media and Publicity), Mallam
Garba Shehu, on the meeting said President
Buhari blamed past administrations for the
situation in which Nigeria is forced to spend
billions of naira annually on alleged subsidies
for petroleum products.
Shehu quoted the president as saying that the
escalation of petroleum subsidy payments over
the recent years was due to the deliberate
neglect of the nation’s refineries, oil pipelines
and other related infrastructure in order to
allow the importation of petroleum products
and for corruption to thrive.
The President restated his huge
disappointment with the way Nigeria’s oil
industry has been run since he left office as
Petroleum Minister and Military Head of State.
He said he was convinced that if the
development of the country’s domestic refining
capacity and petroleum products distribution
network had kept pace with national demand,
there would not have been any need for the
huge subsidies being paid to importers.
“They allowed the infrastructure to collapse so
that their cronies can steal by bringing in
refined products from overseas,” Buhari said.
The President urged the chairman and
members of the RMAFC, who availed him of
their view on the vexed issued of petroleum
subsidy payments, to go “back to the drawing
board” and come up with more humane
proposals to rescue ordinary Nigerians from
the “wicked manipulation” of the country’s oil
industry by corrupt operators.
Buhari also warned that severe sanctions will
be visited on any individual or organisation that
violates the directive on the payment of all
national revenue into the Federation Account.
He said the Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation (NNPC), the Nigerian Ports
Authority (NPA) and other MDAs which
previously relied on the laws establishing them
to retain all or part of revenues collected by
them, did so illegally and must now comply
with the Constitution by paying all revenues to
the Federation Account.
Buhari also chided the RMAFC for approving
excessive remunerations for some political
office holders and urged the commission to
seek a proper interpretation of its powers and
address the public outcry against the
unreasonably high payments.
Mbam disowned media reports of the salaries
and remuneration running into several millions
of naira being paid to National Assembly
members.
According to some of the reports, the federal
lawmakers are earning as much as N4 million
every month.
But Mbam said that no member of the National
Assembly should receive more than N1 million
as salary going by the calculations of the
Commission which have been published on its
website.
He said “We have done a lot in informing the
general public on the true position of the
renumeration packages.
“First and foremost, it is on our website. It is
clearly written there and we have had course to
publish these renumeration packages severally
in many national dailies.
“We have also had interactions with press at
different fora where we explained what the
commission had determined.
“What we read on the pages of newspapers is
not known to the Commission because there is
no member of the National Assembly, based
on what we determined, that should earn up to
N1million per month.
“We are currently reviewing the subsisting
renumeration packages and it is going to reflect
the socio-economic realities of today.”
He said the foremost challenge of the
Commission is improper funding and that it
deserves financial autonomy so that it can
benefit from the advantage of federal
government’s first line charge.
Mbam also demanded for powers of
enforcement and sanction for the RMAFC to
enable it fully implement its mandate to fix the
salaries and emoluments of allý elected and
appointed public officials, including in the
judiciary, at all tiers of government.
He said: “One of the challenges is that the
commission is not properly funded and we are
saying that we expect that the Commission
should be one of the agencies of government
that should have financial autonomy. The best
way to do that is to include it as one of the
agencies that will benefit from first line charge.
“The second is to give the Commission the
power of enforcement. They should review the
Act establishing the Commission so that it can
have power of enforcement and sanctions on
any of the defaulting Ministries, Departments
and Agencies (MDAs).”

Source: thenationonlineng.net/no-federal-lawmaker-should-earn-more-than-n1m-says-rmafc/

Our legislooters may not allow this to see the light of the day. Buhari's anti graft campaign may be hampered by the crop of lawmakers we have now

Slash it. Anyone of them that doesn't like it can Honourably resign many Nigerians will gladly take it.

So for many years now, how come did RMAFC now has the balls to say this?

In time of OBJ they didnt talk, in Jona's time it was free for all, now Buhari is here, everyone is jittering. Ok now.
Still wailers will wail and SeverusSnape will still be silly nonetheless.

Jobless Lady F, Introvert and other teens will still remain jobless jostling for front page when their age mates are already making money building business and starting families.

Good development. Our collective prayers goes thus; "MAY IT SEE THE LIGHT OF THE DAY"

I will be bak

That will be better..... Reduce their Money and Fight for post will be reduce......

Barcanista, any negative impact?

Supported.

Nigeria needs to be restructured. Any president that addresses issues without the structure of the country is not doing enough.

Hope they will abide

That part stating that he's not aware should be removed. How could he make such claim?

They'll soon start shouting now..

Who woke you from your sleep

thank God for this development... i cant understand why they earn so much for doing nothing....
they are always going for breaks for no reason at all....imagine they were getting 46k everyday for news papers...kia....God will deinately punish those guys....nigerians have never benefited from benefits of these clowns. now the office will no longer be attractive....at least they will stop killing themselves to be senators presidents or house of reps leaders.

Is the one million naira monthly or annually?

The job they do and the number of sittings is not even worth N200,000 monthly

Their earnings should be in proportion of the economy and financial viability of the country, period!

True talk! !!

Assuming na Jona win election. Sa boboribo!

it is only in Nigeria that u can earn 4million naira every month for sitting and going on breaks..... awon oloribu