Reechoing Awo on the workability of democracy in Nigeria

Recently, both traditional and social media have been awashed with the humongous remunerations of Nigerian political office holders and there seems to be an agreement that these people are apparently in office to foster mainly their own parochial selfish interests. Nigerians see the self award of politicians’ huge earnings as clearly inappropriate, excessive, and outrageous, in the face of the country’s gargantuan problems.

This kind of parochial selfishness is not new as can be seen from Awolowo’s warning far back in 1980 at the Tribune Group’s luncheon to mark the silver jubilee anniversary of the introduction of free education in the defunct Western Nigeria. Hear Awolowo’s contention:

When the National Assembly expends so much time and energy in discussing the salaries of its members, while it does so little about reasonable minimum wage or income for the working-classes and peasants; when our parliamentarians conceive of something in the neighbourhood of N2,000.00 per month, by way of salary and allowances each for themselves, in a country where the low-income group earn as low as N70.00 per month … we can be sure that the end of democracy is in sight, even though, in our blinding self-seeking, we may not perceive it.

Awo’s query, then, was premised on the propriety of giving reasonable minimum wage for the working-classes and peasants. This same period witnessed one of President Shagari minister’s contemptuous derison and jibing that he could not see Nigerians suffering in so far as they had not been eating from dustbins.

In contemporary Nigeria, it has been difficult to exonerate most of our leaders from the permissiveness and intemperance of governance that Awolowo complained of. For example, a peep into the earnings of the senators under the present government shows that the total salary and allowance of every Nigerian senator stand at N29.48 million monthly or N353,760,000 annually. So, the 109 Nigerian senators have awarded to themselves N38,559,840,000 (almost N40 billion), in a country where millions are wallowing in abject poverty!

This is even to the exclusion of the just approved 500 million naira to each senator for constituency projects. The justification for this award is still unclear. Now, N500,000,000 multiplied by 109 gives us N54.5 billion. If this money is released to the states for infrastructural development and the welfare of the people, each of the 36 states will get more than N1.5 billion. This is enough to give a boost to the infrastructural development of the states and the welfare of the people.

Moreover, the allocation of vast salaries, allowances, and emoluments to ex governors and their deputies has been viewed by many Nigerians as atrocious and appalling. In its editorial of April 2, 2024, Thisday refers to the average annual payout of over N1.6 billion to each state ex governor and his deputy and N4.5 billion for furnishing their residential buildings, as “bogus pensions.”

This staggering allocation, amounting to almost N220 billion in all the states is even to the exclusion of other goodies like massive houses in their states and the Federal Capital Territory, overseas’ medical bills (including dependants), new SUV and escort vehicles every three years, six full-time pensionable domestic staff, furniture allowance equivalent to 100 per cent of their salaries, car maintenance equivalent to 30 per cent of t per cent of their salaries, and entertainment allowance up to 10 per cent of their salaries, as catalogued by Thisday. Worse still, most of the governors, who have found their ways to the Senate, are still enjoying the payoff from their states in addition to their massive emoluments as senators.
 
Moreover, most political appointees, despite their extremely enormous salaries and emoluments, in the face of a meagre N30,000 monthly minimum salary for federal government workers (as at November 2023), still steal from the coffers of government. For example, a minister was recently suspended by President Tinubu on the allegation of approving the payment of almost N600 million into the private account of a civil servant. The fact that the money allegedly being siphoned is meant for alleviating the poverty of millions of vulnerable Nigerians underscores the causticity of the minister’s act.

Thus, with the legislative and executive arms conspiring to milk the country dry while ignoring the suffering masses, our Fourth Republic politicians have surpassed the greed and insensitivity of those of the earlier Republics. This heart-rending extravagant and wasteful misallocation of resources is happening even with the gargantuan and titanic socio-politico-economic problems crying for solutions in the polity. All these specious and spurious earnings  could be put to better use to cushion the effect of epileptic infrastructure, illiteracy, poverty, diseases, insecurity, and untimely death in the land.

Is it not paradoxical that more than 44 years after Awo had spoken, the trend still continues? Even when people like Chief Femi Falana (SAN),  Professor Itse Sagay (SAN), and Dr. Oby Ezekwesili do not relent in pronouncing the practices as being aberrant, especially from a moral standard, the stiffnecked politicians still continue to turn deaf ears. To add insult to injury, some of them still have the temerity of rudely and sardonically caricaturing poor and suffering Nigerians in deceptive facade pronouncements like “let the people breathe!” This kind of bamubamu ni mo yo “I am on full belly” sarcasm, recently coming from a highly placed Nigerian senator, is insensitive, heartless, and inconsiderate.

Let me end this essay by appealing to our very distinguished leaders to make this democracy work. It is high time you started to initiate and support programmes that will contribute to a high level of welfarism for the common people. The sustainability of democracy is doubtful where you spend the bulk of the money of the State on your salaries and allowances. If you continue with this impunity, how will you be able to give the best minimum wage and provide for the basic needs of the citizenries? Lastly, please remember that it is selflessness that has made “probity and accountability” the mantra in the global contemporary governance setting. Indeed, it is massive self-sacrifice and not self-obsession that can make democracy work in Nigeria.

I cannot see anything wrong in the political system we operate – presidential or parliamentary. What is wrong is in our devaluated, devalued, and undervalued value system. Let us work for a stable democracy in Nigeria by building, accepting, and practising a value system that is consistently anchored on puritan morality. This is what can remove the unnecessary stress and uncertainty from our beleaguered country and save our democracy. This is food for thought.
Dr. Babatunde, a legal practitioner, wrote from Zagreb Croatia.