The Federal Government has promised that a new minimum wage will be ready by the third quarter of the year. The Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, who stated this at the 2018 May Day celebration in Abuja, stressed that government will prioritise the welfare of workers and end delays in the payment of salaries and pensions. The Vice President also noted that the minimum wage, which is the minimum amount of compensation an employee must receive for putting in his or her labour, must be anchored on the principles of social justice, equity and fairness.
While observing that those who can pay above the minimum wage as some states and sectors have been doing are free to do so, Osinbajo explained that he was optimistic that the tripartite committee, comprising government, labour and the private sector will hasten up the process to enable the Federal Government present an executive bill on a new minimum wage to the National Assembly for passage into law as soon as possible.
While the new minimum wage is being expected, the President of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Ayuba Wabba, has pointed out that all employers of labour must pay the new wage, stressing that the payment should no longer be restricted to employers that have 50 workers and above. The NLC leader also stated that there should be minimum pension for all retired workers including those that are currently receiving N2000 as monthly pension.
We commend the government for setting up a committee to come up with an acceptable new minimum wage for all workers in the country. At the same time, we urge the committee to hit the ground running and bring forth a workable new minimum wage before the September deadline. It should be admitted that getting an acceptable and workable national minimum wage for all categories of workers in the country would be daunting.
There is no doubt that the negotiation can be contentious considering that it is coming in a year of a general election. But, on no account should the new wage be politicised. Let all the stakeholders agree on a realistic new wage that all sectors will be willing to pay. It will be recalled that a national minimum wage as envisaged by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) convention is the basic minimum wage, which any worker in a country will earn per month. However, employers of labour are free to go above it, but never below. The convention also recognises the minimum number of workers any establishment must have to be bound by the new wage.
Although the ILO convention on the minimum wage recommends a five-year review period, the last attempt to fix the minimum wage in the country was undertaken under the former President Goodluck Jonathan administration in 2011 when the monthly minimum wage was fixed at N18,000. Before then, there was a second attempt during former President Shehu Shagari’s administration in 1982 when the wage was fixed at N90 per month. In both exercises, the negotiations were not holistic and as such did not recommend condign penalties for default. We believe that these lapses will be corrected in the present negotiation. We urge all the stakeholders to exercise utmost patriotism in coming up with the new wage.
Since Schedule 2, Item 34 of the 1999 Constitution places the responsibility to fix a national minimum wage exclusively on the Federal Government, let the state governors eschew their political differences and cooperate with the committee in fashioning out a new wage for Nigerian workers.
It is very important that all stakeholders involved should understand that a national minimum wage, worth its name, is one that employers of labour are willing and able to pay. Therefore, all contentious issues on the minimum wage must be exhaustively discussed and agreed upon.
We advise that the committee should hasten up the process and fix an acceptable new minimum wage by the third quarter of the year as the government has assured.