Labour tells Governors to pay new wage to avoid industrial unrest

– Steve Ovirih.

Unless a peace deal is struck between Labour across the federating states of Nigeria and the Nigerian Governors Forum, a mother of all industrial disharmony may soon be looming across states in Nigeria.

Report coming from the Nigerian Governors Forum has it that the agreement between Federal Government and labour on consequential adjustment on the new minimum wage is not a binding agreement on the states. What this implies is that the states shall not as a matter of obligation align with the Federal Government’s decision to pay their workforce the salary adjustment benchmark .

In fact , the demands from the Governors Forum as at the time of filing this report is that there is already a strong clamour for an upward review of the revenue allocation to states so as to enable them cope with the new regime of minimum wage increment and salary adjustment. Of note however is the fact that some few states have already shown interest to pay according to the Federal Government benchmark. Kaduna state for instance has keyed into the new minimum wage policy. The discordant tunes among the Governors which show that majority of the state Executives might renege on the collective resolve to pay the new National minimum wage benchmark has already began to draw the ire of the organised Labour.

Speaking at separate fora in Abuja, the scribe of the Joint National Service Negotiation Council (JNPSNC), Comrade Quadri Olaleye noted that workers will negotiate with any willing Governor that will open talk with them, but will not hesitate to stand up to the Governors that will want to discountenance the tripartite agreement that painstakingly resolved the #30, 000 minimum wage bench mark and the consequential salary adjustment which all have agreed on.

Comrade Olaleye expressed his disappointment over the fact that some Governors can go to the extent of exposing to the public the fact that their electoral promises on workers’ welfare was a ruse that they were not willing to fulfill. “They have nothing they are waiting for in the Government House if they are not going to fulfill their promises to Nigerian workers,” Comrade Olaleye thundered. The Labour leader said the collective advice of the organised Labour to Governors who cannot pay is to resign now as their failure to be upright to their state’ workforce on the new minimum wage will cause avoidable and untold industrial harmony.

The opinion of the Chairman Nigerian Governors Forum, Gov. Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti state has always been that minimum wage does not mean the same thing as general salary review across board and some state Governors have latched unto this to even demand for an upward review of the state revenue from the Federal Government in order to meet up with the new workforce wage bill.