Joe Ajaero, the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress, has criticized the Federal Government’s announcement of a salary increase, calling it mischievous.
The Federal Government authorized a wage increase for government servants in several consolidated salary systems on Tuesday, ranging from 25 to 35 percent.
Speaking on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Wednesday, Ajaero stated that the previous minimum salary of N30,000 had ended on April 18.
“We should be in the regime of new minimum wage as of today. Discussions were supposed to have been concluded,” Ajaero said.
“The federal government through the national assembly legislated on it. But we saw that the discussion entered voice mail because the federal government refused to reconvene the meeting that was adjourned.
“I think the announcement now appears mischievous because there is no wage increase that the government is announcing.
“For them to announce it now, is an issue that we are worried about at the NLC and even at the TUC.”
Ajaero added that the livable wage for civil servants has been agreed upon by organized labor to be N615,000.
“Living wage is such that will, at least keep you alive. It is not a wage that will make you poorer and poorer. It is not a wage that will make you borrow to go to work.
“It is not a wage that will lead you to be in the hospital every day because of malnutrition. For that living wage, we have tried to look at N615,000,” he added.
“Let me give you a breakdown of how we arrived at that figure. We have housing and accommodation of N40,000.
“We asked for electricity of N20,000 — of course, that was before the current tariff increase. Nobody can spend this amount currently.
“We have a utility that is about N10,000. We looked at kerosene and gas which is about N25,000 to N35,000.
“We looked at food for a family of six, that is about N9,000 in a day. For 30 days, that is about N270,000. Look at medical, N50,000 provided there will be no surgery or whatever.
“For clothing, we looked at N20,000. For education, N50,000. I don’t know if those who tried to put their children in private school, will not be able to cope with this amount. We also have sanitation of N10,000.
“I think where we have another bulk of the money is transportation. This is because the workers stay on the fringes and because of the cost of PMS, which amounted to N110,000.
“That brought the whole living wage to N615,000 and I want anyone to subject this to further investigation and find out whether there will be any savings when you pay somebody on this rate.”
