Labour, FG Fail To Reach Agreement On Minimum Wage Implementation

The federal government and representatives of organised labour on Tuesday failed to reach an agreement on the full implementation of the new minimum wage, which includes the consequential adjustments of salaries for civil servants from grade level 7 to 17.

However, the parties will meet again on Wednesday to finalise negotiations and possibly reach an agreement.

According to Deputy President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Amaechi Asugwuni, the meeting will help to address issues that remain critical.

“We actually thought the meeting will be concluded today but that prediction was unsuccessful, and therefore adjournment became necessary. To the best of our knowledge, the struggle we say continue applies.

“Tomorrow (Wednesday) we meet at 2 pm and that meeting also determine the fate of parties. We expect that we close that meeting positively. So far, commitments have been shown, but we believe the areas that are still in context are critical,” he added.

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The rescheduled meeting which is the deadline of the ultimatum issued by labour is also expected to iron out grey areas, and the Acting Head of Service who represented the Federal Government, Mrs Folasade Yemi-Esan stated that a final agreement will be reached after the meeting.

“Both sides have made a lot of concessions but we discovered that there are some grey areas that need to be ironed out, so some documents and information are being sourced, which we are providing and by tomorrow discussions will continue and we believe that we will be able to get everything resolved by tomorrow.”

The labour unions are demanding for a 29 percent salary increase for officers on grade 7 to 14, and 24 percent for grade 15 to 17, but the Federal Government is proposing 11 percent for officers on grade level 7 to 14, and 6.5 percent for officers on grade level 15 to 17.

Both the government and the workers’ unions are however keeping sealed lips on who is ready to shift grounds on the demands and proposals already made.