The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, has urged the incoming president, Bola Tinubu to review the current minimum wage of N30,000 currently obtainable in Nigeria.
The minister, who appeared on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday, stated that he would write in his handover notes that the discussion about minimum wage should begin as soon as the next government is sworn in in May 2023, rather than when it is implemented in May 2024.
According to the most recent law, he added, these talks between the federal government, the business sector, and the states should begin a year before the law goes into effect.
He said, “It is a tripartite negotiation involving public sector, private sector and state governments. We entrenched in that bill or law that minimum wage will now have an automaticity of review every five years.
“So, from 2019 when it came into effect to 2024 will be five years but we also made a recommendation in our document which we submitted that the discussion, the negotiation should start one year from May 2024 when it supposed to kick-start.
“So, I’m envisaging that as from May 2023, the government will empanel the new minimum wage review committee for the nation.
“In my handover note which I am going to hand over to the transition committee and the next government, I am recommending that the discussions start anytime from May 2023.”
Ngige also mentioned that the Federal Government has approved a wage increase for government officials beginning on January 1, 2023, and that this increase is already accounted for in the 2023 budget.
In light of the country’s current economic situation, the minister said a raise in salaries was necessary, though he noted that President Major General Muhammadu Buhari (ret.) has not yet approved the percentage that will be used.
He said, “In the Presidential Committee on Salaries, we have done something for the civil servants for those who are on Consolidated Public Service Salary Structure and some corporations, MDAs that are on that CONPSS. CONPSS is the salary scale for civil servants.
“We put a percentage for the President to approve, we have approved it at our own committee level. We said it should take effect from January 1, 2023.”
