Appendix to Press Release: a Nigerian senator earns more in Salary than Barack Obama and David Cameron Effective from January 1, 2001, the annual salary of the president of the United States was doubled to $400,000 (N60m) per year, including a $50,000 expense allowance making the president the highest paid public servant. The $400,000 includes everything and $350,000 out of it is taxable. Below is a table of the earnings of some politicians in the US: Public Officers Earning per year ($) Earning per year Naira (million) President 400000.00 60.0 V. President 227300.00 34.1 Speaker of the House 223500.00 33.5 Majority Leader (Senate) $193,400 29.1 Minority Leader (Senate) $193,400 29.1 Other Senators 174000.00 26.1 Majority Leader (Representative) $193,400 29.1 Minority Leader (Representative) $193,400 29.1 Cabinet Secretary $193,400 29.1 * Exchange rate is set at $1.00 = N150.00*Please note that US Vice President is also the Senate president.Below is a table showing some of the items in the new (reduced) package for the members of the Nigeria National Assembly: Items Senator (N) Representative(N) Basic salary/Regular allowances 11,145,200 9,926,062 Furniture 3,039,600 2,744,454 Motor Vehicle Loan 5,066,000 4,963,031 Duty Tour Allowance per day 23,000 21,000 Severance Gratuity 6,079,200 5,955,637 Estacodes $600 $550 Other allowances expressed as percentages of basic salaries are: Hardship Allowance @ 50% Constituency allowance @ 200% Newspaper allowance @ 50% Wardrobe allowance @ 25% Recess Allowance @ 10% Accommodation @ 200% Utilities @ 30% Domestic Staff @ 75% Entertainment @ 30% Personal Assistance @ 25% Vehicle Maintenance Allowance @ 75% Leave Allowance @10% Analysis This analyses translate to the fact that in addition to the regular and legitimate salaries and allowances of N17 million ($113,333) and N14.99 million ($99,933) which senators and reps were collecting yearly and the irregular allowance of estacodes, duty tours etc, they were also collecting N192m ($1.28m) and N140m ($0.93m) respectively in illicit quarterly allocation which is not provided for by RMAFC. Effectively, a Nigerian senator was taking home at least $1.40m ($1.28m quarterly allocations + $0.113m regular salaries and allowances) as against the $0.174m an American senator takes home hence a Nigeria senator earns at least 8 times as much as an American senator and more than 3 times the American president. Whereas a Senator in the U.S earns N21, 146,000, the same as a member of the House of Representatives; a UK Member of Parliament earn £64,766 (N14, 896,180) In other words, a Federal Legislator in Nigeria is paid more than double what a Member of British Parliament earns per annum. Senate President David Mark alone takes N250 million quarterly or N83.33 million per month. Senate Deputy President Ike Ekweremadu gets N150 million per quarter or N50 million a month. Mark and Ekweremadu earns in 4 months, six times what the UK Prime Minister earns in a year. David Cameron goes home with £190,000 per anum (N43, 700,000) In a Next newspaper news article entitled ‘An Assembly for looting’ written by Musikilu Mojeed with Elor Nkereuwem, the authors rightly claimed that each of the 360 members of the House of Representatives were getting N35 million in cash money in quarterly allocation while each of the 109 Senators pockets N48 million each. These allocations have however been slashed by 20% to N27 million ($180,000) and N38 million ($253,333) respectively due to the 20% reduction requested by the late president. The cut has been a source of a major controversy in the House of Representatives in the past few days where members are agitating to jerk up the sum to N42m quarterly at a time when the government is lamenting being broke and when the already signed 2010 budget is being cut by as much as 40%. What a bunch of greedy inhuman lots! The discordance has caused members of the House to force the speaker, Dimeji Bankole to reduce his quarterly allowance from N140m ($933,333) to N100m ($666,667) or from an annual allowance of N560m ($3.73m) to N400m ($2.67m). According to data obtained from CIA World Factbook, Nigeria has an estimated per capital income (purchasing power parity) of $2,400 in 2009 as against USA’s $46,400. This means that the average earning in the US is 19.33 times as much as in Nigerian. With the reduced salary package, a Nigeria senator still get paid N11 million ($73,333) in regular salaries and allowances annually and N152m ($1.03m) in four (quarterly) allocation making a total of $1.11m plus irregular allowances like estacodes and duty tour allowances. The Senate has allocated N1, 024,000,000 as quarterly allowance to its 10 principal officers, known collectively as the Senate leadership - Each of the eight other principal officers take home N78 million every three months or N26 million per month. Besides, for this year, the Senate has voted N2.6 billion for local travel, N2.45 billion (foreign travel), N1.25 million (security), N2.28 billion (contingency), N750 million (guest houses for Mark and Ekweremadu), and N500 million (establishment of radio and television stations). The Executive Branch of government A Nigerian Minister is paid N31,915,800 (32 million) per year, comprising salary (2,026,400), and benefits plus allowances (N29,889,400), American secretary (N23,488,000); British Secretary (N29,736,000) German Minister (N30,287,667.20)." A Nigeria Minister of State gets N30, 538,248 (salary N1, 957,580; allowances N28, 580,666) higher than those of a South African Minister (N7, 704,558); Compare again to American secretary (N23, 488,000); British Secretary (N29, 736,000) German Minister (N30, 287,667.20) A local government councillor in Nigeria earn over N1 million per month while a university professor, or a director in a ministry is paid peanuts as take home. The salary review of political office holders till date revealed that 17,474 officials earned N1.12 trillion yearly of the N1.12 trillion about N94, 959,545,401.20 billion is spent on salaries and N1, 031,654,689,033.18 trillion goes to allowances annually. While 16,540 out of the political officeholders, as revealed from the document emanating from the Presidency to the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) are expected to undergo a pay cut in line with former President Yar’adua’s proposal earlier in the year, this is yet to take effect. The officers are: Federal Executive (472); Federal Legislature (1,152); Local Government Executive (3,096) and local government legislature (8,692). According to the document, officers taken this large lump sum evidently, approximately 17,500 officials only constitute 0.014 per cent (less than a quarter of a percent) of Nigeria’s estimated 140 million people. Again, it is common knowledge that the salaries of these officers amount to nothing compared to the juicy fringe benefits that accrue to them. It could be recalled that ministers, advisers, legislators salaries were all jerked up in 2007 and 2008. While the members of National Assembly got 100% pay rise which would cost Nigerian tax payers N52.4 billion every year, and an additional N15.02 billion as multi-purpose allowances given to the lawmakers on quarterly basis, the package accruing to the federal executives had jumped by over 1,000 percent to N98 billion due to their allowances as compared N65.5 billion paid the federal executives during the last regime. The last time Nigerian workers ever had an enhanced salary package was in 2000 when former President Olusegun Obasanjo announced the N5, 500 and N7, 500 minimum wages both for state and federal workers respectively. Comparison of the Salaries of Politicians vis-a- vis other professions in USA and Nigeria The politicians’ salaries listed above might look big to you but if you look at what is obtainable in the society, you’ll surely get the drift. I’d like to compare the earning of these top political positions with those of surgeons in America. According to ehow, several factors such as experience, employer, location, gender and degrees may affect the earnings of a heart surgeon. Salaries discussed here are median earnings from 2009. • Degree: A cardiac surgeon with a Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) degree will earn an average yearly salary of $292,774. If he has completed a Ph.D., however, the annual salary may rise to $400,000 on average. It can be inferred from this that a surgeon earn as much as the president or even more. And in nearly all cases a surgeon earns more than the VP and other public office holders. In the US, top attorneys in a top legal firm earn as much as $500,000 annually, a top journalist (like Christiane Amanpour) earns over a $1m, Wall street guys and top business executives earn $ millions in salaries, benefit, stock options etc.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Jul 2013 01:53:35 +0000
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