Senate President David Mark yesterday reacted to Central Bank governor's statement that National Assembly members consumed 25 percent of the nation's budget overhead by revealing that the CBN governor's office gulps N300 billion yearly.

Mark, who addressed newsmen at the Benin Airport, while on a visit to Edo State to commiserate with state government over the demise of the wife of the Edo State governor, Mrs Clara Oshiomhole, expressed displeasure over the misrepresentation of facts and figures by the CBN governor to mislead Nigerians about the take-home pay of federal lawmakers.

According to him, "It is not correct; Nigerians should get their facts right because the Central Bank governor said our overhead which is N150 billion equates to 25 percent. The Central Bank itself has got an overhead of N300 billion; what does that equate to by simple arithmetic, that is 50 per cent. So people are not discussing on facts; they must discuss on facts," he explained.

On whether the Senate will toe the same line with the House of Representatives by giving assent to the proposed Electoral Amendment Bill to make national parliamentarians automatic executive members of their various political parties, he said, "The two houses gave their own draft bills and will look at it individually and, if there are differences, then they harmonize. There is no way I can tell you of what will come out of the harmonization."

While reacting on the menace of cancer the disease that led to the death of Mrs Oshiomhole, he disclosed that the management of cancer poised great challenges globally and called on government and private individual to fund researches towards finding solution to the ravaging scourge of cancer.

"The executive can always establish hospitals or research centres on this, and individuals can also go into this too. The management of cancer all over the world forms a major concern of governments and individuals in the medical practice. I believe that this is an opportunity in this country for us to begin to look in that direction, at those specialized areas."