A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress in Osun State, Prince Dotun Babayemi, has said that the outrageous remuneration currently being earned by the members of the National Assembly will be drastically reduced if the legislative arm of the Federal Government is run on parttime basis.
Babayemi also said that the emoluments of the legislators should be reviewed downward alongside a proper amendment of the 1999 constitution, which he described as a “military regime constitution.”
Speaking with our correspondent in Osogbo, the APC chieftain noted that the involvement of intellectuals in politics would right so many wrongs and would also give back more to the people.
Babayemi argued that there was no other country in the world that spent as much as Nigeria on its lawmakers, blaming the jumbo package paid them for the worsening level of poverty in Nigeria. He said that the act of law-making should not be done on a permanent basis as most politicians now misconstrued it as a career.
Babayemi said, “The act of making laws should not be a permanent job. Every l a w m a k e r should have something he or she does to feed himself. But it’s unfortunate that in this country, legislators wait for the huge salaries and allowances before they can feed themselves. I believe that legislation should be a part time job. In the global poverty scale, Nigeria is very high and this is partly because of the jumbo payments received by our lawmakers.
“There is no country that the legislature spends as much as in Nigeria. This problem goes back to our constitution; this is a Military regime constitution that needs amendment. We need part time National Assembly. Some people make it a career and it should not be so. We have to encourage people who are intellectuals to go there and push the change. Intellectuals in politics are there to be able to give back to the people.”
The APC chieftain added that Nigeria’s form of democracy had yet to draw people closer to their leaders, stressing, “Our democracy is maturing. As we evolve, we want democracy that will get closer to the people.”
Babayemi, who is a security expert, therefore, called for more responsible professionals to join politics, saying that if they did, people would get more dividends of democracy and would be better led. Throwing his weight behind the restructuring of the country, the APC chieftain said Nigeria would develop better with the proper rearrangement of her Federal structure.
“Restructuring is critical to Nigeria’s survival as a nation. For instance, Zamfara and Osun have the highest gold deposits in the nation and they are on the exclusive list of the Federal Government, while the challenges of the extraction bounce back on the people of the states. What comes from a region should be to the benefits of the people of the region. I also support state or regional police,” he said.
