President of the Trade Union Congress (TUC), Festus Osifo, on Friday, posited that the organised labour’s expectation for a new minimum wage announcement on May 1 is unrealistic.
Recall that the government set up a 37-member tripartite committee on the minimum wage in January.
To this end, organised labour proposed and submitted a demand of N615,000 as the new minimum wage for workers, and urged the government to announce the new minimum wage on Workers’ Day.
In a chat with News Agency of Nigeria, Osifo said negotiations with the federal government on a new minimum wage are ongoing.
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His words: “The negotiation by the tripartite committee is still ongoing. If you remember, the TUC earlier submitted N447,000 as the new minimum wage but we have harmonised our figure with the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).
“It is now N615,000. Regarding the ‘when’ for the new minimum wage, the committee is still working.
“So, certainly, May 1, will not work for the pronouncement of the new minimum wage. Except if the federal government wants to pay the minimum wage of N500,000 to workers.
“If you look at the N615, 000, you will think that the amount is right but when we did that computation, a dollar was about N1, 700.
“I am hopeful that the committee will meet after May 1.”
