The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has threatened to embark on a full month’s protest over reported plans by the National Assembly to deregulate and decentralise the national minimum wage.
NLC’s threat came on Tuesday, following months of fruitless negotiations between Organised Labour, the Federal Government and the Organised Private Sector.
Speaking at the 67th Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association Annual General Meeting in Lagos, on NLC President, Joe Ajaero, said, “As we are here, a Joint Committee of the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the Judiciary are meeting. They have decided to remove section 34 from the Exclusive legislative list to the concurrent list so that the state governors can determine what to pay you and so that there will be no minimum wage again. You cannot decide what you should earn.
“The very moment the House of Representatives and the Senate come up with such a law that will not benefit Nigerian workers, they will be their drivers and gatemen, and there will be no movement for one month. We cannot accept any situation where the governors and the National Assembly members will foist a slave wage on workers and force poverty on the citizens. Organised Labour will not accept it.”
According to him, status and volume of work was similar nationwide.
He said: “We don’t have a situation where people determine their wages that amounts to some level of illegality. In the constitution, there is a provision for equal work for equal pay. If we go into job analysis and job evaluation, we may discover that a clerk here may be doing the same work as the clerk in Sokoto.
“The so-called decentralisation of wages to pay somebody here less than what the other person is receiving is against the concept of equity and equality before the law.”
NLC president said that the International Labour Organisation (ILO) recognised wage as a national law that should not be left to sub-nationals.
He said: “Every country has their minimum wage and some states are paying higher than the basic minimum wage, and that is the position of the law anywhere.
“We have put our members on notice that if these people succeed in coming up with such unpatriotic and obnoxious law. This democracy they are playing with, we have enough in this country in terms of hardship. Some people, based on their privileged positions want to inflict more Injuries on the workers and citizens of this country and that will not be accepted.”
He added that the labour movement will not accept “slave wages”.
“Every worker in Nigeria across the country is seen as Nigerian workers and any attempt to discredit them in a federation will first be resisted by the NLC.
“There is no Governor that is not receiving the same thing nationwide, they are not receiving according to their revenue in their states, but they want that of the workers to be so. So, the issue of using revenue as a basis for the payment of minimum wage is a lame one. If any governor is making that argument, then he doesn’t know what governance is all about.”
