Nigerian governors have said they cannot afford to pay workers a minimum wage of N30,000 unless the organised labour wants its members to be sacked. A
Nigerian governors have said they cannot afford to pay workers a minimum wage of N30,000 unless the organised labour wants its members to be sacked. Apart from this, the governors at their emergency meeting in Abuja on Wednesday night, asked the Federal Government to also accede to the review of the national revenue allocation formula. The Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum who is also the Governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Abdulaziz Yari, who read the communiqué after the meeting, said that a new committee would be raised to meet with President Muhammadu Buhari over the issue.
He said the committee would work out another formula towards quickly resolving the problem associated with the proposed minimum wage adding that the proposed N30.000 minimum wage was impracticable unless labour agrees to a downsizing of the workforce all over the country or the Federal Government itself accedes to the review of the national revenue allocation formula. The committee, which is headed by Amal Pepple, recommended N30, 000 as minimum wage. Though the President received the report, he however said that he was still studying it. Yari said that the committee did not consider the submission of the governors who had earlier said they could only afford to pay N22, 500 as minimum wage.
“We are paying N18,000 (as minimum wage today), but when the President assumed office, about 27 states were not able to pay, not that they chose not to pay. So, now you say N30,000, how many of them can pay? We will be bankrupt (if we pay). So as Nigerians, we should look at the issues seriously. While other people are saying that governors are riding jets and living in affluence, that one is not luxury but compulsory. Like Lagos that is paying about N7bn as salaries; if you say it should pay N30,000, now it will be N13bn. From our calculation, it is only Lagos State that will be able to pay N30,000. As Nigerians, this is our country; there is no other country we have and we should be fair to this country.”
He said governors would continue to dialogue with workers on the need for them (the workers ) to see the difficulties they (governors ) were facing.
“For instance, the money Lagos State is using to pay is not coming from Abuja. They have a way of getting their money from the IGR and that is why they can afford to pay. They get money through VAT (as well). Apart from Lagos, even Rivers State cannot afford to pay. So we have been crying out about this since 2011 but no one will listen. It is the same labour that is pushing for the N30,000 that will still turn around to say that the governors did not do any infrastructure and how are we going to achieve that by paying only salaries?”
In his reaction, the General Secretary of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Dr Peter Ozo-Eson, said that the governors should not mix up the issue of negotiation for minimum wage with sacking or employing workers. According to him, the organised labour was only interested in pursuing what would be the minimum wage of workers and ensuring that the workers were not subjected to slave/master situation in their country.
Ozo-Eson said, “The process of downsizing is governed by an established process under the International Labour Organisation Convention. We are not discussing downsizing of the workforce or employment of workers. What we are discussing is the minimum wage. We want to know exactly what the minimum wage is. The issue of downsizing is of collective bargaining. The issues should not be mixed. We don’t want workers to be slaves to their employers.”
