NLC announces strike, frowns on government’s decision to re-classify National Minimum Wage

*The Nigeria Labour Congress proposes to protest in the 36 States Houses of Assembly as it frowns on plans by the House of Representatives to change the current National Minimum Wage structure for workers

Alexander Davis | ConsumerConnect

In reaction to the proposal by the House of Representatives in the National Assembly (NASS) to amend the current wage structure, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has pronounced its scheduled industrial action slated for March 10, 2021.

ConsumerConnect learnt the Organised Labour’s decision to propose a strike is informed by an imminent mandate by the Senate to remove the National Minimum Wage from the Exclusive to the Concurrent legislative list.

National Assembly Complex, Abuja, FCT

The NLC also stated that the proposed protest would be held in the 36 States Houses of Assembly in reaction to the plans by the House of Representatives to alter the present wage structure.

This decision granted the Federal Government the autonomy to negotiate minimum wage for workers in the country, according to NLC.

Comrade Ayuba Wabba, President of NLC, and Ismail Bello, Acting General Secretary of the Labour Union, in a joint communiqué signed by the duo after an emergency National Executive Council meeting Tuesday, March 2, in Abuja, FCT, declared that the Congress would resist “any attempt to exterminate Nigeria’s working class.’’

The national lawmakers in the House of Representatives were said to have debated a bill to remove the powers to negotiate wage matters from the exclusive to the concurrent list.

According to the lawmakers, this is due to the inability of state governors to pay the N30,000 minimum wage for the move, report said.

Nonetheless, Wabba stated that the workers would not watch “hard-fought rights, which are global standards, bastardised by opportunistic and narrow-thinking politicians.”

The communiqué also noted that the move by the NASS is an attempt to undermine Nigeria’s working class.

He said: “The NEC decided that there will be a national protest action commencing from March 10, 2021, in the Federal Capital Territory and especially to the National Assembly.

“The NEC decided that should the need arise, it has empowered the National Administrative Council of the NLC to declare and enforce a national strike, especially if the legislators continue on the ruinous path of moving the national minimum wage from the Exclusive Legislative List to the Concurrent Legislative List.”