N29m monthly too small for senators, governors earn N700m to N1bn— Senator

Former Senator for Adamawa North, Ishaku Elisha Abbo has disclosed that he earned N14.4 million every month while in the Upper Chamber but stated that senators now earn N29 million monthly.


This sum, he said, included a salary of N1 million plus allowances.


However, he said N29 million was meagre considering the responsibilities shouldered by senators, arguing that governors earn between N700 million and N1 billion monthly.


Abbo spoke during an interview with Arise TV on Monday, reports Daily Trust.


He insisted that while many Nigerians considered the senators’ monthly take-home princely, “N29 million looks big on paper.”


The controversial ex-senator maintained that his monthly earnings as a senator were considerably below what he earned as a private citizen.


Abbo said, “N29 million looks big on paper, just on paper. I am saying this as a very honest man. I am not trying to support the National Assembly, an institution so vilified and I have been a member of that vilified institution for five years. I am not siding with them, but I will bear the facts on the table.


“When I was in the Senate, my monthly salary and allowances put together was about N14.4 million, and at the end of the month, the company I founded, which I was the managing director and CEO, when I won the election, I had to leave the company to go into governance, I had to start subsiding my own life.


“Because the money allocated to my office was N14 million which was absolutely nothing considering the demands, the want, the challenges.”


Abbo added, “Every month from all over Adamawa state, in fact at a point from all over the country my office is besieged with people looking for help. At one point I had to start calling some state governors to help me with cases that are being brought from their state to my office.


“I am paying a lot of people’s scholarship in my office, I am subsidizing some people’s life in my office, while a state governor in this country is going home with over N700 million every single month, some go home with N1 billion.”