The Nigerian Labour Congress is on a collision with the federal government a major dispute involving the minimum wage for workers. The strike has gained support among broad sections of the working class in the oil-producing West African state.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
Monday, 08 November 2010 00:00
From Collins Olayinka (Abuja) and Lawrence Njoku (Enugu) News
Nigeria Guardian Newspaper
CNPP, LP ask Jonathan to honour deal with workers
NIGERIAN workers may not be alone in the struggle for a new minimum wage and their planned nationwide strike.
At the weekend the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) rejected the new presidential panel on the new minimum wage set up by the Federal Government to sort out “technical and practical issues” in the recommendations of the Minimum Wage Committee headed by Justice Alfa Belgore.
But some opposition parties, which expressed support for Labour’s demand for the immediate implementation of the new wage and its proposed three-day warning strike, said they would back other legitimate actions to make government pay the N18,000 monthly minimum wage.
The parties are the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP) and Labour Party (LP).
Labour, which reacted to the formation of the technical committee headed by Vice President Namadi Sambo, accused the government of buying time with the new panel.
After a meeting on the new minimum wage chaired by President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja last Thursday, the Council of State (NCS) and the National Economic Council (NEC), raised the Sambo committee, which NLC said was a delay tactic.
In an interview with The Guardian yesterday in Abuja, NLC General Secretary, John Odah, said the setting up of another committee to study what had been agreed upon by the tripartite panel was designed to water down the Belgore report.
He said even in 2000 when the last minimum wage was done, the recommendation was packaged in the form of a bill for straight transmission to the National Assembly for passage without another scrutiny by any committee.
Odah said: “We are going on the strike, the setting up of a committee notwithstanding. The issue here is sanctity of process. In tripartite minimum wage negotiations that we have had in this country, the processes have been very straightforward. Once there is a consensus among the tripartite partners, which include Labour, employers and government, the consensus is then written as an Act and then forwarded to the National Assembly. In 2000, when we had the one that we are struggling for its replacement, that was what happened. It took us about one year to get to where we are now and government is now attempting to circumvent that process by reopening of issues which we have already had an agreement on.
“The purpose of setting up the minimum wage tripartite committee included three state governments; and then there was a directive to all the states to send in memoranda on what government as an employer will be able to pay. After this agreement has been reached, we certainly do not see any wisdom in setting up another committee on the same issue that had been settled. We see the new committee as an attempt to water down the agreement that had been previously reached,” Odah said.
NLC said it was not satisfied with the outcome of the Council of State meeting and would therefore continue to mobilise for the three-day warning strike, which begins on Wednesday.
“We are not satisfied with this new approach and are hereby justified in carrying out the warning strike to drum it to the government’s hearing that it has not done enough to earn our rescinding our strike threat.”
LP Chairman, Dan Nwayanwu, in a reaction to the NLC’s planned strike, insisted that the Belgore’s recommendations should be passed without any alteration.
He submitted that government had shown “lackadaisical approach” in the matter for too long while subjecting workers to undue suffering.
Nwayanwu said the inability of workers to earn living wages since Independence demonstrated the lack of seriousness of government officials to alleviate the suffering of Nigerians.
He said: “All the developments in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and other state capitals are made possible by the workers through hardwork and commitment. All they have been paid with is massive looting at the expense of those who generated the wealth.
“Labour Party sides with the workers and will match with them to Aso Rock and other places to make the implementation possible.”
Nwayanwu, therefore, called on Jonathan, not to waste time in ensuring the bill is presented to the National Assembly for accelerated debate and passage.”
He added that it is a matter of regret that since Independence in 1960 no successive government had on its own implemented wage raise without a strike.
The CNPP, which also expressed support for the strike, urged Jonathan to respect the National Minimum Wage Agreement of N18,000 a month reached by the tripartite panel.
It said the respect of the agreement would avert an industrial action in the midst of national recession.
In a statement by CNPP National Publicity Secretary, Osita Okechukwu, it claimed ignorance of the new National Minimum Wage Bill Jonathan referred to apart from the National Minimum Wage Act of 2000, which pegged the least paid public sector worker at N5,500.
“It is therefore regrettable that either Jonathan or the National Council of States is being misled by the incremental salary increase for federal workers.
“It is our considered view that the Tripartite Committee Report has provided a critical legal framework for a new National Minimum Wage. Accordingly, it is incumbent on the federal, state and local governments and the private sector to adopt; as they were duly represented throughout the one year - from July 4, 2009 to July 1, 2010 - sittings of the Belgore committee”, Okechukwu said.
CNPP said it could not separate the monumental corruption going on in the nation’s public institutions as well as poor rating in the Global Competitive Index and Transparency International from abysmal poor remuneration of Nigerian workers.
“Is it not paradoxical that a president, who is on jumbo salary, with uncountable perks of office is wavering on granting workers who go to the same market, a less than living wage? Moreso, when the workers are aware that state governors and parliamentarians are also on jumbo pay.”
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