EXTRA: N13.5m as sleeping allowance? Behold, our federal lawmakers

Some lawmakers might have their N13.5 million “running cost” as sleeping allowance.

From the senate to the house of representatives, these “distinguished senators and honourable representatives” have “sleeping” as an agenda on their to-do list while at plenary.

This strange style of legislation is more popular in the upper legislative chamber. Some of the lawmakers who have been caught at one time or the other are Barnabas Gemade, representative of Benue north-east senatorial district and Yusuf Yusuf, senator representing Taraba central.

While other lawmakers are busy raising “matters of urgent public importance”, these legislators in question would rather prefer to raise their own “matters of urgent personal importance” by withdrawing into their shells and drifting off to sleep only to be exposed by the cameras.

In most cases, they arrive late for plenary, sometimes up to one hour after the commencement of the business of the day and they rarely stay back till the end of the sitting – unless of course they are lost in their sleep.

So, who says lawmaking is a business for only serious people?