Organised labour and federal government reach agreement that suspends strike until Friday

NIGERIA'S labour movement has suspended its ongoing nationwide strike over a disagreement with the federal government on the minimum wage for a week in a last ditch attempt to reach a negotiated settlement.

Over recent months, Nigeria's National Minimum Wage Committee has been working on negotiations regarding a new rate to reflect current economic realities. Nigeria's current minimum wage of N30,000 ($20.16) a month is wholly inadequate, especially in the face of the hyper-inflation tearing the country apart, with labour unions asking for an increment that will guarantee a wage of N1m a month.

Of late, labour leaders recently settled for N615,000 ($414) a month for lowest ranked workers but the tripartite committee set up by the government has refused to accept that figure. Last month, the federal government and the organised private sector (OPS), made an offer of N48,000 and N54,000 respectively, which was later increased to N60,000.

However, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) rejected this offer as derisory and with no headway being made, a nationwide strike began on Monday. Apart from the minimum wage, the unions are also calling on the federal government to reverse its recent electricity tariff hike.

After a six-hour meeting between the leadership of organised labour and the federal government last night, the two sides agreed to suspend the strike until Friday in the hope of finding a solution. They issues a joint statement expressing the commitment of President Bola Tinubu to raise the N60,000 offered as the minimum wage.

Their agreement stated: “The president of Nigeria is committed to establishing a national minimum wage higher than N60,000 and the tripartite committee will convene daily for the next week to finalise an agreeable national minimum wage.”

Also, organised labour agreed to immediately hold meetings of its organs to consider this new offer and no worker would face victimisation as a consequence of participating in the industrial action. These resolutions were signed on behalf of the federal government by the minister of information Mohammed Idris and the minister of state for labour and employment, Nkeiruka Onyejeocha.