THE House of Representatives had another rowdy session on Wednesday, May 11, 2011 over a N10 billion bank loan which Speaker Dimeji Bankole said he took on behalf of the House. As a result of the legislative chamber’s indebtedness, its official bankers, the United Bank for Africa (UBA), withheld the second quarter allowances and emoluments of its 360 members. A member of the House from Kogi State, Mr Dino Melaye, stated in a motion he brought before the House that other principal officers had claimed that they were not aware that Bankole took any loan. He said the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had released the statutory allocation for the payment of members’ entitlements to the bank but that the bank was holding on to the money. Melaye, one of the 11 suspended but now readmitted legislators, said investigation had shown that the House was broke. He called for the constitution of an ad-hoc committee to investigate the finances of the House as he wondered why the Speaker alone got the loan without the approval of the House.

THE revelation provoked an uproar among the members and outrage among the people. The Nigerian public has for long been up in arms against the National Assembly over the unconscionable cost of maintaining its members. From the beginning of the present democratic dispensation in 1999, Nigeria’s federal legislators have been acting in defiance of public opinion. In spite of widespread criticism, the first set of lawmakers paid themselves N3 million each as furniture allowance. They were called names — printable and unprintable. It has since dawned on the people that what they saw as unfathomable greed in the first four years of this fourth republic was a mere prologue. This explains why they have been watching the main event — the excesses of current legislators — with mouth agape.

THERE have been several instances of resort to fisticuffs in the House of Representatives. Most of the time, the issues at stake revolved around money. When the federal lawmakers are not abusing legislative functions and powers by allocating money to themselves, they are perverting the process of appropriation by colluding with officials of government establishments to inflate budgets for selfish pecuniary benefits. Without regard for the pathetic state of the economy, quality of life and level of unemployment, members of the National Assembly have been allocating to themselves (not earning) multiples of what is paid to their opposite numbers in the developed economies to which they travel so frequently for sightseeing in the name of official duties. Senator Olabiyi Durojaye was in the upper legislative chamber from 1999 to 2003. He said in a recent interview that what legislators earned during that period is less than 70 per cent of what today’s National Assembly members collect. The pertinent questions that arise from the above are: What are the additional functions of the present federal legislature which were not in the schedule of duties of the 1999-2003 National Assembly? Can such additional duties - if any - justify the astronomical increase in the cost of maintaining the same institution?

THE contentious N10 billion loan was taken by Bankole in May last year. There was no report or complaint of any shortfall in the financial provisions for the House during the year 2010. Bankole should therefore tell Nigerians the purpose or project for which he used N10 billion over and above the budget for the House during the year in question. Why has the loan been a closely-guarded secret until this terminal point in the life of the current National Assembly? For how long would it have been a closet affair if the bank that granted the loan had not acted the way it did to recover its money?

THE governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, deserves commendation for his instruction to commercial banks not to give any loan to the House. It is also our fervent hope that the presidency will not be moved by blandishments or any form of pressure for a bailout. Doing so will amount to encouraging financial recklessness and outright irresponsibility in the handling of public funds.