THE Federal Government has proposed N62,000 as the new minimum wage, a N2000 increase from the earlier N60,000.
According to report by Punch, the decision came after the tripartite committee on the national minimum wage concluded its negotiation with the representatives of the labour and the organised private sector.
“After wasting our time, they finally came up with the offer of N62,000 which was backed by the private sector. Labour also reduced ours to N250,000. This is embarrassing,” Punch quoted a source to have said.
The government’s proposal of N62,000 represents about 100 per cent increase from the current minimum wage of N30,000
However, the organised labour was said to have demanded for a much higher minimum wage, pegging the earlier N615,000 to N250,000.
The development came as governors across Nigeria’s 36 states opposed the N60,000 minimum wage initially proposed by the federal government.
The governors rejected the proposal in a statement by the director, media and public affairs of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), Halimah Salihu Ahmed, on Friday, June 7.
The ICIR reported that organised labour, consisting of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) had rejected the federal government’s N60, 000 offer as minimum wage.
The rejection resulted from the failure of the federal government to agree with the union’s N615, 000 demand.
The workers embarked on a strike which started on Monday, June 3 and relaxed on the following day, to compel the government to agree on an acceptable minimum wage..
The suspension of the industrial action was at the heel of the resolution reached between the federal government representatives and the labour after a six-hour meeting on Monday evening, June 3, in Abuja.
The government agreed to improve the minimum wage offer beyond the initial N60,000, with President Tinubu ordering the Finance Minister, Wale Edun to prepare a template for the workers minimum wage.
Usman Mustapha is a solution journalist with International Centre for Investigative Reporting. You can easily reach him via: umustapha@icirnigeria.com. He tweets @UsmanMustapha_M