Organised Labour was divided, yesterday, over what the new minimum wage should be. The lack of unanimity was evident at public hearings organised by the Tripartite Committee on National Minimum Wage, TCNMW, across four of the six geo-political zones of the country.
In the South-West, while leaders of the Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, proposed N794,000, those of the Trade Union Congress, TUC, proposed N497,000 as minimum wage as the Director-General, Michael Imoudu National Institute for Labour Studies, MINILS, Ilorin, Kwara State, Comrade Issa Aremu, said the range should be between N120,000 and N200,000.
In the South-East, the NLC said it preferred the new minimum wage to be N540,000, while the TUC suggested N447,000.
However, South-South workers proposed N850,000, with their North-West counterparts angling for N485,000 minimum wage.
This happened as North-West governors shunned the parley with their South-West colleagues, saying it will be hard to sustain higher wages for their workers without a significant adjustment in some of the narratives in the national economy, such as revenue sharing formula.
However, Governors Douye Diri (Bayelsa) and Umo Eno (Akwa Ibom) promised to abide by the resolutions of the parleys.
Drama in South-West
The differences in the proposals of the NLC and TUC in the South-West came as governors from the zone said the majority of governments in the zone could hardly sustain improved wages and salaries for workers as things stand now.
Organised Labour is advocating a N500,000 minimum wage, following the submission of proposals by state chapters to the headquarters of the congress.
The hearing is aimed at hammering out a new minimum wage that aligns with the current economic conditions and meets the expectations of workers.
On the government’s part, the argument was that even though workers deserve a new wage, each state should be allowed to negotiate with its respective workers because of its peculiarities.