Chairman, Senate Committee on Culture and Tourism, Rochas Okorocha has called for a maximum of four legislatures per state to the national assembly.
Okorocha said the nation should restructure the configuration of the national assembly to have one senator per state and three members of the House of Representatives insisting, these number can efficiently legislate for the development of the country.
According to him, the economic demand associated with the huge membership of the National Assembly in both chambers in terms of running cost was huge and a drain on the budget.
He said it requires some pruning to release funds for the nation’s budget which has in the last five years been running on a deficit.
Only recently, the senate mooted the idea of collapsing over 600 agencies of government, president of the Senate, Ahmed Lawan, said have outlived their relevance and have constituted a drain on the nation’s resources.
“Let me give you a typical example of how to run this year budget to achieve our target equal.
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“Here we have three senators per state. In that national assembly over there (House of Reps) there are over 360 eligible human being in this small building.
“This country must begin to make the sacrifice and cut down on the cost of governance we mist start being painful as it may be.
“Now our constitution provides that we have three senators per state. What will the three senators per state be doing that one senator per state cannot do?
“What are we doing in the House of Representatives with over 360 members and each of these persons create demands on the system. We must cut down on the cost of governance.
“What we need to have under the present ugly situation which our constitution forced on us is to have one senator per state and three members of the House of Representatives per state.
“And secondly the budget should be skewed to fund the productive sector of the economy.” Senator Okorocha said.
The president of the senate in his response to Okocha called on the senator to sponsor a bill on his thoughts of restructuring the national assembly.
Lawan said the issue was purely constitutional and would require an amendment of the constitution
His words: “Your contribution could be translated into a bill if you want a state to have only a senator, it requires a constitutional amendment.
“So, you have the opportunity to present a bill for the amendment of the relevant section of the constitution which provides for three senators per state.
“I think my personal opinion is the national assembly and the legislators are tasked to think deep and wide on how we can increase revenue no matter how big or small.
“And prudently and efficiently applied that requires total and comprehensive holistic oversight of the executive arm of government. This we must do and we must not fail in that,” the President of the Senate submitted
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