Cash crunch: Senators, Reps abandon chambers in search of money

It is traditional in the military to talk about the morale among personnel being low or high. But there hardly seems to be a better way to describe the current mood in the two chambers of the National Assembly, than to say that the spirit of lawmakers is quite low.

The low morale in the Assembly is not unconnected to the increasingly loud complaints from members that they are cash-strapped. These days, it’s commonplace to hear lawmakers discuss how they and other colleagues are struggling to meet their financial obligations even as their salaries are seldom paid on time.

Indeed, the late payment of salaries to members has contributed to the financial struggles of the lawmakers as the controversial constituency allowance is now paid along with salaries, contrary to when it was paid quarterly -with speculations up until 2014 placing the allowance of House members at N36 million.

But now, lawmakers no longer have a large chunk of money quarterly to play around with, their salaries where the money has been diced into smaller chunks come late. A lawmaker confirmed to Saturday Sun, that his October salary hadn’t been paid as at last week.

The Sun, November 19

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