BEVERLY HILLS, August 17, (THEWILL) – Barely four days after describing the constituency projects embarked upon by members of the National Assembly as corruption, former president Olusegun Obasanjo has bemoaned the bogus allowances and salaries collected by the lawmakers, who he described as a bunch of unarmed robbers.
He made this disclosure on Thursday at a public presentation of a book written by Prof Mark Nwagwu, entitled “I am Kagara, I weave the sands of Sahara”, held at University of Ibadan, an event where he acted as the chief host.
Lamenting that overhead, allowances, salaries take 90 per cent of the nation’s revenue while not much is left for capital development, he said: “It is even worse for the National Assembly. They will abuse me again, but I will never stop talking about them. They are a bunch of unarmed robbers.
“They are one of the highest paid in the world where we have 75 percent of our people living in abject poverty. They will abuse me tomorrow and if they don’t, maybe they are sleeping. The behaviour and character of the National Assembly should be roundly condemned.”
The former president urged the Federal Government to respect the agreements it signed with the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, because the government allowed itself to be stampeded into signing the agreements without full consultation within government.
He regretted that government allows itself to be rushed into signing agreement, particularly, when one group or the other withdraws their service and goes on strike.
“But an agreement is an agreement; whoever the agent is that signed that agreement on your behalf, you are bound by it. You may now have to renegotiate to have a new agreement, but the agreement earlier signed remains an agreement,” Obasanjo declared.
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