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By Chinelo Obogo
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has said it is unconstitutional for lawmakers to decide their salaries, saying those who should uphold the law are the ones undermine it.
While delivering a speech at the 60th anniversary celebration of Afe Babalola’s call to the bar held in Ado Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital,
the former president said the fixing of salaries for elected officials is the responsibility of the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC),but that lawmakers now fix salaries for themselves.
“Under paragraph 32(a-e) of Part I to the third schedule of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), the commission is saddled with determining the remuneration appropriate for political officeholders, including legislators, among other functions.
“The point in Nigeria which I have seen and which I can attest to is most of the people who are supposed to be operationalising or managing and seeing the constitution and democracy move forward, they are actually the ones who undermine the constitution.
“All elected people, by our constitution, their emolument is supposed to be fixed by the revenue mobilisation commission, but our lawmakers set that aside and they make laws and put any emolument for themselves.
“Even if that is constitutional, it is not moral and, of course, it is neither constitutional nor moral,” he said.
He also complained that so many other aspects of the Nigerian Constitution such as the federal character has saying that the Federal Character Commission is barely carrying out its function and that when the constitution is breached, the country’s democracy suffers.
He commended Babalola for his contributions to the development of the country, saying, “You have met this world at a point, you have met your community at a point, you have met your family at a point and what you have done is that what you have met, you have made it better than what you have found.”
