The Trade Union Congress has called on state governments to implement the new minimum wage and its consequential adjustments to avoid industrial action.
Festus Osifo, President of the TUC, made the call while addressing newsmen at the end of its National Executive Council meeting.
At the end of the meeting on Tuesday in Abuja, Osifo said that the NEC-in-Session had raised concerns about the slow pace of implementation in some states, and also on issues that were affecting workers and downtrodden Nigerians.
According to him, some states have made progress with the implementation of the minimum wage with up to 80 percent of the necessary adjustment processes already in place, while others remain significantly behind.
He said: “But there are still some states like Zamfara and Cross River that are still backward, and that is why today the organised labour in Cross River is organising a two-day warning strike.
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“If the government is not responsive, those two days will now escalate to an indefinite strike.
“In Zamfara, a similar thing may likely happen.
“We are calling on them to quickly get to the table, have a conversation and reach a conclusion on what the consequential adjustment should be.”
Osifo said that the minimum wage issue was beyond the simple announcement of wage figures such as N30,000, N80,000, or N90,000.
He said that the core issue was the implementation of the necessary adjustments to align wages with the new national standard.
The TUC president, therefore, urged the state governments to prioritise the welfare of workers and engage in meaningful dialogue with labour unions to resolve the matter.
He said: “There are some states where there is no conversation whatsoever about the implementation of the new minimum wage.
“We call on these states to implement the new national minimum wage, along with the consequential adjustments so that workers can start benefiting.”
Osifo also said that the issue of rising taxes would increase the tax burden on citizens and this could lead to tax evasion.
He, therefore, urged the government to reconsider any proposed tax hikes, particularly at a time when many workers were struggling with the delayed implementation of wage adjustments.
Speaking on the recent GDP report for the third quarter, Osifo said that while the economy is growing, the service sector, especially banking, played a dominant role in that growth.
He called on the government to focus on encouraging investment in other key sectors, including agriculture, manufacturing, and real estate, which he said could create more jobs and reduce unemployment.
He said: “Government should encourage these banks to lend more to the real sector of the economy.
“It is that sector that hires a lot of Nigerians, that will hire a lot of workers.
“We want Nigerians to be engaged.
“So we hereby call on the government, through the Central Bank of Nigeria, to come up with robust policies that will encourage the banking sector to lend much more to the real sector of the economy.”
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