Broadly, the four major ways by which individuals become rich legitimately the world over are: by being entrepreneurs (starting and running successful businesses); by being investors (having the good sense to invest in successful businesses); being sought after celebrities; and through inheritance. Not so in Nigeria, because we specialize in turning logic on its head. I can be so stupendously rich through none of the four mentioned ways and no one will care to ask how I became wealthy.
And the very agency that is suppose to help rein in public servants is the one promoting political recklessness. How does one explain the fact that the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), realistically an unneeded agency, is asking for pay increases for all categories of political office holders. The commission argues that the monthly salary of N1.5 million the President earns is a “joke” just as the salaries of other office holders. RMAFC says that ministers who are paid just under N1 million a month are “grossly underpaid”.
This is a fact, but up to a point. In today’s economy, the government of President Bola Tinubu has made a million naira look like a thousand naira. But it is also the same government that approved N70,000 as minimum wage for Nigerian workers. This implies that the President earns 21 and a half times more than the least paid worker in the country.
Add to the fact that the President lives free of charge in a trillion naira (perhaps more) government apartment, eats free food, has several free perks running into billions of naira a month. So, the President doesn’t have to spend a dime from his meager N1.5 million salary. Not so for the poor worker who earns N70,000 as the economy throws him or her into perpetual debt just to survive.
The RMAFC, by its enabling Act, is charged with determining the remuneration of political officeholders, including the president, vice-president, governors, deputy governors, ministers, commissioners, special advisers, legislators, and other officials listed under sections 84 and 124 of the constitution. And the last review of salaries for these categories of Nigerians was in 2008. So, there is a case in seeking to review their salaries.
By advocating for pay rise for political office holders, which is admittedly low, another agency of government (perhaps the ministry of labour and productivity) should also be advocating for pay raises for others in government. Nigerian civil servants are abysmally underpaid. N70,000 a month as minimum wage is $46. A few five star hotels in Lagos and Abuja charge this for a buffet meal. In a different perspective, this is what a United Kingdom least paid worker earns in four hours. A United States’ equivalent worker will have to put in six hours to earn what his counterpart in Nigeria earns in 30 days. A South African worker earns ten times what his Nigerian counterpart takes home. Now we can see how government deliberately impoverishes its citizens.
Add to this, the RMAFC fails to recognize that in Nigeria, political office holders do not play by the rules. It is only a Balarabe Musa, or an Obiageli Ezekwesili who would not embezzle public funds. Most public and political office holders steal loads of cash from the public treasury, and it is these same people that the commission wants to be paid more money. RMAFC’s hackneyed refrain is that poor pay for these set of Nigerians is tempting. Shouldn’t the argument apply to all who are poorly paid?
On paper, senators earn somewhere around N1 million a month. But everyone, including RMAFC, knows that each senator (excluding the senate leadership) earns N21 million monthly. This is exactly what a professor in Nigerian public universities earns in two years.
Nigerian senators and House of Representative members are perhaps the only employees in the world who decide what they earn. The National Assembly sets its budget and not even the President is “allowed” to query it. To the best of my knowledge, it is only Nigerian legislators who also carry out executive duties such as execution of constituency projects (a stylish euphemism for slush funds). Some of these crop of over-pampered Nigerians contribute next to nothing to the economy of the country. Just last month, a report from Erudite Growth and Advancement Foundation showed that for all of one year, 48 members of the House of Representatives and five senators did not make any contributions during plenary by way of sponsoring bills, moving motions or participating in debates. Which begs the question: What are they being paid for?
We do not want to talk about what is happening at the state level where emperors (mistakenly called governors) rule. The current political system wills public funds to those few individuals who find themselves in public office. Which explains why elections in Nigeria are usually more of a race to capture the treasury and a do or die affair.
As we speak, another round of industrial action is brewing in our public universities simply because lecturers are very poorly paid. A professor earning less than N700,000 a month is a mockery of our value system. To be sure (and as earlier mentioned above), every civil servant in Nigeria is paid peanuts. Thinking of increasing the wages of political office holders only when most civil servants are languishing in penury is like spraying pepper in someone’s eyes. The recent riots in Indonesia were caused by government’s plan to increase the salaries of political office holders there. To stem the spread of violence, the government of President Prabowo Subianto has had to remove some of the perks of these people.
The RMAFC should perish the thought of increasing salaries of political office holders in Nigeria. It is simply insensitive. Government needs to revamp the economy, boost the exchange rate, reduce inflation and interest rates while also increasing the salaries of all workers so that Nigerians can earn living wages.
The primary reason some of Nigeria’s best brains are leaving the country mainly to Europe and North America is the very poor pay for. Some universities, especially the private ones, lack quality lecturers; quality engineers in critical sectors are lacking, hospitals, particularly the public ones do not have enough and qualified doctors and nurses.
Unless something is done urgently, sooner than not, much of Nigeria’s critical sectors will be run only by those who should not be there. In the end, Nigeria seems to be working mainly for our political office holders and their cronies.
Monday, 1 September 2025
Esiere is a former journalist!
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