A former Minister of State for Defence, Sen. Musiliu Obanikoro has demanded a review of the budget of Senate and House of Representatives as a strategy to reduce cost of governance.

Obanikoro lamented that democracy has become expensive.

He stated this while speaking with newsmen in commemoration of Nigeria’s Democracy Day.

He urged the government to make the budget of the National Assembly more transparent.

“It is expensive because we have made it so. Let me give you a good example because we borrowed this system from America.

“In America they don’t provide accommodation for lawmakers, they fend for themselves when it comes to that, they live basically on salary and very small fringe benefits.

“Democracy doesn’t have to be this expensive, that is one thing we don’t get right,” Obanikoro said.

Speaking further, he argued that if the budget of the two legislative houses would be made transparent, the recent calls for a parliamentary system of government would have been avoided.

“When the budget is more transparent, and people can go online and see what is allocated to every member of the National Assembly and can also input into the process, I do believe that will make the process or the institution less expensive.

”This clamour that the bicameral system of legislature should be jettisoned will reduce if the budget is reduced, because the idea is that there are some budgetary provisions that should never be in our books and we must be bold enough to expunge them.

“We cut the budget size of the National Assembly to a reasonable level that an average Nigerian can live with,” Obanikoro, added