The Trade Union Side (TUS) of the Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council (JNPSNC), has called on the Federal and state governors to implement the new National Minimum Wage or face the wrath of workers.

The group urged governments at all levels to take urgent steps to implement the new national minimum wage to reduce suffocating poverty in the land.

The group, which argued that workers’ patience has been overstretched, said the draconian law of ‘no work no pay’ by the Federal Government is not tenable and can not deter workers.

They also demanded that the new wage be enacted into law immediately, threatening to mobilise against state governors that fail to implement the new figure.

A statement by its chairman, Abdrafiu Adeniji, and secretary, Bashir Lawal, regretted that instead of the Federal Government to send a bill to the National Assembly to enact the 2018 National Minimum Wage Act, it decided to embark on a fruitless plot to subvert the entire negotiation that took more than one year to conclude.

They posited that labour is in the exclusive legislative list, and as such, the Federal Government should proceed to enact the National Minimum Wage Act, rather than intimidating workers by invoking a primitive labour law of no work no pay rule, where the International Labour Organisation (ILO) is harping on international labour best practices.

The labour leaders emphasised that once the Federal Government sends the new national minimum wage bill to the National Assembly, and it is passed into law, it will become binding on the state governments.

They pointed out that apart from their humongous emoluments, governors appropriate billions of naira as security votes that are not accounted for, positing that the Federal Government was taking the understanding shown by the trade unions for granted, and thinks that its anti-people policies would continue without resistance.

“Nigerian workers are determined, and no amount of intimidation will cow them from demanding for their right. The Federal Government should, therefore, send the National Minimum Wage bill to the National Assembly without further delay.”
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