Lawmakers are BROKE: House of representatives demand N30m quarterly allowance
Lawmakers of the lower chamber of the National Assembly are reportedly cash strapped as a result of the delay in the payment of their quarterly allowances.
The third quarter allowance, which is meant to cover July to September was not paid to the lawmakers before they proceeded on their annual holiday on July 17.
The official allowance is between N27.9m and N30m and is received by each lawmaker every quarter of the year.
Punch reports that several of the members of the house or representatives are unhappy about the non-payment of their allowances, with some even being vocal about it. Meanwhile, some of the lawmakers have made several bank trips to check their account balance after they failed to get credit alerts.
However, a senior National Assembly management source, confirmed that the lawmakers had not been paid, while also explaining that the situation was not caused by in-house disagreement at the assembly but rather as
a result of delay in release of allocations by the Ministry of Finance.
The source said, “Third quarter allocations have not been released to us; they know that there is no way there can be money in their accounts without the allocations being released to us.
“The money usually comes after the FAAC meeting, which holds towards the end of the month. Somehow, their holiday started before the FAAC meeting and no money has been released. Everything will be sorted out after the general allocation is released. It is just a little delay; nothing more.”
Meanwhile, apart from their quarterly allowances, the lawmakers receive an official monthly salary of between N900,000 and N1.1m.
