Minimum Wage Planned Protest: FG, Labour Meet Jan. 4

The Federal Government has said it will meet with organised Labour to forestall the threat of national industrial action over non transmission of the New National Minimum Wage bill to the National Assembly.

This was disclosed on Wednesday in a statement signed by Samuel Olowookere, the Director of Press in the ministry of Labour and Employment on behalf of the Minister, Chris Ngige.

The statement announced a meeting between the minister and officials of the labour on January 4. It said: “The Minister of Labour and Employment, Sen. Chris Ngige, is scheduled to hold a meeting with the Executives of the Organised Labour Union on Jan. 4, at the Minister’s Conference Room by 10:30 am prompt.

Recall that the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, had threatened to embark on a nationwide protest on Jan. 8. 2019 if the President Muhammadu Buhari failed to transmit the bill for the new national minimum wage to the National Assembly.

Labour had also rejected the proposal by Buhari to set up another technical committee to look into the recommendations of the tripartite committee, insisting the tripartite committee was ‘technical’ enough and describing Buhari’s plan as a delay tactics.

Labour is insisting on the implementation of the agreement to pay N30, 000 minimum wage while the governors are saying they did not agree to pay the amount but proposed N22, 500.