The leadership of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) is pleased that the Council of State, in its meeting yesterday, November 25, 2010 advised Mr President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, to forward to the National Assembly the negotiated new national minimum wage of N18, 000.
Congress is happy and commends the Council of State for this welcomed advice after a protracted negotiation on this matter. By this intervention, we are hopeful that the long awaited new national minimum wage is coming to an eventual resolution. Congress also commends Mr President for keeping faith with Nigerian workers for whom he has within the last one year demonstrated the commitment to improve their welfare.
Congress, however, wishes to express its strong disapproval of the position advanced by the governors who briefed the press following the decision of the Council of State who have hinted that the process for the country's national minimum wage be deregulated so that states can pay whatever they wish to workers. We wish to unequivocally state that this suggestion, which they said is in line with the concept of federalism, is completely unacceptable to Nigerian workers. We therefore advise the National Assembly to disregard the advice.
It is our belief that the framers of our constitution, in the instance of a national minimum wage, rightly recognise the logic of the federal government setting the minimum standard for the entire federation. It is essentially for that purpose that the issue of national minimum wage is in the Exclusive Legislative List. The intention, therefore, is that when an affordable minimum wage is set, other employers in the federation can then improve on it.
Congress believes that the National Assembly is well equipped to carry out this task as they are representatives elected from all parts of the country. We wish to emphasise that this has been the practice since 1981 and we expect that this should continue.
Nigeria Labour Congress Issues Press Statement On Minimum Wage (http://www.saharareporters.com/news-page/nigeria-labour-congress-issues-press-statement-minimum-wage)