The Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, has vowed to mobilise its members across the country against plans by the Senate to remove minimum wage from exclusive to concurrent list.
Addressing journalists shortly after its congress yesterday in Abuja, President of the congress, Abdulwaheed Omar, said labour would do all within its powers to ensure that the proposal did not scale through.
According to him, if the proposal scales through, it will plunge workers into untold hardship that will further affect the growth of the economy.
"The NLC national executive council meeting therefore resolved to mobilise its members across the country against the decision of the Senate," he said.
He said the NLC had drawn up a number of measures to persuade the Senate to desist from carrying out its proposal.
Omar said the NLC has equally earmarked several activities that would be carried out after a meeting with the National Executive Council of the Trade Union Congress, TUC, of Nigeria.
He said the NLC would also meet with relevant stakeholders, including some members of the Senate, the House of Representatives and state Houses of Assembly, among others.
The president further said that the provisions, as proposed by the Senate, excluded the private sector 'which is also part of the bedrock of the economy.'
"If such an amendment is allowed to go through, it means that tomorrow, Nigerian workers will wake up without any moderation.
"Their employers will determine what to pay them and since there is no legislation on ground, they won't have anywhere to lay their complaints.
"It is not too late and we are still urging the Senate to listen to the voice of reason.
"The putting of minimum wage in exclusive list is not an accident. It is a very carefully calculated thing in order to make sure that the most vulnerable group of workers is taken care of," he said.
Omar said labour would continue to negotiate with well-meaning Nigerians, including members of the House of Representatives, who did not toe the line of the Senate, as well as state Houses of Assembly.
The union also expressed readiness to meet with the members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, with a view to convincing them to resume negotiation with the Federal Government.
The NLC president said efforts are ongoing to convince ASUU to resume discussion with the government with a view to restoring normalcy to the nation's university system.
He said congress was studying the various issues in contention and would finally wade in, not only to ensure that discussion resumes, but to also endeavours that it produced a lasting solution.
Omar declared that a situation whereby lecturers had been out of the classrooms for close to two months would not help university education in the country.
National Mirror
Whatever they want to do should just be done properly. And the interest of the citizens must be kept @ heart!