President Bola Tinubu’s meeting with labour leaders on the minimum wage has been rescheduled for next week, with labour unions maintaining their demand for N250,000.
The meeting on Thursday was adjourned to next week after about one-hour discussions at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
According to VANGUARD report, the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, leader, Comrade Joe Ajaero and the President of the Trade Union Congress, TUC, Comrade Festus Osifo arrived at the State House about 2 pm, and went straight to the President’s office.
Recall that the Tripartite Committee on the new national minimum wage had recently submitted two figures to the President as the organized private sector and the government team offered to pay N62,000, while the organized labour demanded N250,000.
Due to the disagreement over the minimum wage, President Tinubu has put on hold submitting a bill to the National Assembly, opting instead to engage in further consultations with stakeholders to address outstanding issues .
Speaking to journalists after the meeting, NLC President, Comrade Ajaero stated that there was nothing like negotiation at the meeting rather a discussion on the current economic situation in the country.
Ajaero said, “In real sense, it wasn’t a negotiation but a discussion and we have had that discussion. We agreed to look at the real terms probably and reconvene in the next one week.
“So that’s where we are because we didn’t go down there to talk naira and kobo. At least there were some basic issues that we agreed on.”
Asked whether the organized labour insisted on the N250,000 demand at the meeting, the NLC President said, “I remember mentioning that we didn’t go into naria and kobo discussion. Now the status quo in terms of the amount N250,000 and N62,000 remains until we finish this conversation.”
Also speaking, the President of TUC, Comrade Osifo said that the organized labour put all the economic indices on the table and how it was biting on Nigerians.
“In the meeting we tried to put the issues on the table. Issues that are bordering and bitting Nigerians today, the economic difficulties and the value of naira, how it has also eroded, how these have affected the prices of commodities and goods in the market.
“So, we tried to put these before Mr President because he is the President of the country and the bulk stops at his table.
“We have had all the conversations with all his agents, but today (Thursday) we said let us meet with the father of the country and have this conversation and make the argument that Labour always make.
“We made all the arguments, the economic analysis, macro, micro, fiscal and monetary issues. so we put everything forward and at the end, the President made his remark as the President and we all agreed let’s go back to internalize it, have some conversations and by one week time, we will come back and we will continue the meeting.”
Also Speaking after the meeting, the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, expressed optimism that there would be a positive result after next week’s meeting.
He said, “Recall that already there is 62,000 naira that has been put out there from the government side and the organized private sector but the organized labour is still not accepting that but we know that they will come to the table, we know that this is something that is going to be workable for Nigerians.
“The organized labour and the government will reach an agreement. We have adjourned now for a week. The labour union has asked the government to allow them At least a week to discuss this further and we have allowed them. We’re going to reconvene in the next week and we hope and we believe by the end of day, we’ll have something good for all Nigerians.
“We do hope that by the time we come together again next week, we’ll have something that we can put out for Nigerians to see and to agree with.”
