Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC and Trade Union Congress, TUC said during the weekend that they have harmonised the contending new minimum wage at 615,000 Naira.
The TUC president, Festus Osifo, who made this known to journalists at Abuja, said the N615,000 new minimum wage agreed on by the two unions was based on N1,700 per dollar computation.
The TUC leader said the much-awaited new wage announcement on May 1 might hold.
“The negotiation by the Tripartite Committee is still ongoing. If you remember, the TUC earlier submitted N447,000 as the new minimum wage but we have harmonised our figure with the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).
"It is N615,000 presently. The group is still working on when to implement the new minimum wage. Therefore, unless the federal government wishes to pay workers the minimum wage of N500,000, May 1 will undoubtedly not be effective for the announcement of the new minimum wage," he said.
But he maintained that the N615,000 that organised labour was demanding was not inviolable.
The TUC head declared, "Conversations and negotiations will start and end somewhere because the government also has their markup."
Additionally, Mr Osifo pointed out that a thorough investigation was carried out before organised labour reached that sum.
"You might assume that the N615,000 value is correct, however at the time we performed that computation, one dollar was worth roughly N1,700. "I hope the committee meets after May 1st," he expressed.
"To conduct further discussions and talks regarding the proposed minimum wage, the federal government established a tripartite committee consisting of 37 members," he explained.
Recall that Bukar Aji, the former head of the federation's civil service, serves as the chair of the National Minimum Wage Committee. The private sector, organised labour, and the federal and state governments provided more members.
Vice-President Kashim Shettima described the formation of the minimum wage review committee as a confirmation of President Bola Tinubu's aim to inspire the labour force of the country, calling it the cornerstone of his administration.
The Federal government is aware of the short-term effects of their decisions to save the economy, Mr Shettima observes, assuring Nigerians that better times are ahead.
He asked the committee to be thorough and seek input from a wide range of sources to determine a reasonable pay that would lessen the suffering of the populace.
