Minimum Wage: "Presidency Moves To Appease Labour"

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Following Nigerian Labour Congress’ (NLC) threat to call out workers on indefinite strike on Tuesday to protest non-implementation of the N30,000 minimum wage recommended by the Tripartite Committee on National Minimum Wage, the presidency has moved to pacify the workers, appealing to them to tarry a while on their planned action.

The NLC had asked President Muhammadu Buhari to submit the N30,000 minimum wage implementation bill to the National Assembly for passage by December 31 last year or face a nationwide strike action.

With the deadline unmet, the NLC President, Mr. Ayuba Wabba, had said the Tuesday strike had become imminent despite a federal government offer for a resolution meeting schedule for January 8.

Authoritative presidency sources, however, told new men on Wednesday that the president is making efforts to resolve the wage dispute, which threatens to further obstruct the nation’s fragile economy should the strike hold.

State governors under the auspices of Nigerian Governors Forum had objected to N30,000 as the baseline wage bill for the federation on the grounds that most of the states could not afford it.

Offering N22,500, the governors said anything more would send most of the states into insolvency.
But labour disagreed, contending that N30,000 was a compromised figured, which if diligently pursued would be realisable.

The N30,000 new minimum wage, which was a compromise figure arrived at by the Minimum Wage Tripartite Committee comprised of the government (federal and states), organised private sector and the organised public sector was contained in the report forwarded to President Muhammadu Buhari. Labour had initially proposed N66, 500, while the federal government proposed N24,500 at the negotiation meeting before the N30,000 was adopted.

However, wednesday the federal government said it would meet with the union on Friday.

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, said government had invited executives of the organised labour for a meeting at the Conference Hall of the ministry.

General Secretary of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, Dr. Peter Ozo-Eson, said the labour had received letter from the labour ministry for a meeting on Friday.

Meanwhile, the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has issued a notice to all its structures and organs to commence mobilisation for mass action against the federal government, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), and the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP).

This was contained in a statement signed by the association’s president, Danielson Akpan.
The ASUU commenced a nationwide strike on November 4 after the lecturers accused the federal government of not implementing previous agreements.

The association had earlier issued an ultimatum of two weeks to the federal government, ASUU and ASUP on December 23, to call off the strike or face confrontation.

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