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The senate has responded to the revelation by one of its members, Senator Shehu Sani, on the monthly “take home” of the senators.
Sani in an interview last week, revealed that senators received N13.5 million monthly allowance.
The revelation angered many Nigerians as the senate, despite pressures, have not openly declared how much each senator earned in salaries and allowances.
But in a statement on Sunday, Senate spokesman, Sabi Abdullahi, said Sani “did not disclose anything new “as the figures were contained in various line items and expenditure heads of the budget of the national assembly “which has been made public”.
He dismissed reports that senators were unhappy with Sani.
He said that if people had looked critically at the budget, he said, they would have seen that various line items “like traveling, medicals, consultancy and the rest were captured in the budget and they were the funds divided for each Senator’s use”.
“Almost all holders of elective and appointive offices have running costs allocated to their offices and that cannot be said to be part of their salaries,” he added.
Sani is the first senator to give a breakdown of the “running cost” which used to appear as a heading in the senate’s budget. He showed that the money is paid directly to the senators.