Organised Labour has accused state governments of deliberately delaying negotiations of the N30,000 minimum wage and has threatened to commence industrial action should the states fail to meet its December 31 deadline.
Alade Lawal, Secretary of the Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council (JNPSNC), stated this in an interview.
According to the labour leader, only Lagos, Kaduna and Kebbi states have responded to the letters sent to the state governors following the successful negotiation of the minimum wage at the national level in October.
The negotiating councils, according to Lawal, have struggled to conclude negotiations in about 20 states because of the inaction of the state governments.
He noted that despite the December 31 deadline set for the states to complete all negotiations and pay workers the new wage structure as well as all the arrears, only Lagos State has successfully negotiation accepted by organised labour.
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He disclosed that the offers by Kaduna and Kebbi states were rejected by the negotiating councils due to the meagre increase and lack of input from the states’ labour unions.
“For now, negotiations are moving on but not at the pace we want. Only Lagos State has completed negotiations,” Lawal told the Punch.
“In Kaduna State, the governor declared an amount but the negotiation was done without the input of labour. The salary level is very low already and even with what the governor has proposed to pay, the salaries of workers in the state cannot still be compared to those of workers in other states.
“We have negotiations going on in Kano, Delta, Ebonyi and Akwa Ibom states. We are having positive signals from those ends. Some other states like Ondo and Kogi are warming up to begin negotiations.
“We have a problem in Kebbi State. Negotiation began in the state but midway before it could be completed, the governor went ahead and issued a unilateral circular.
“He started giving N7,000 increase in salaries of workers across the board, that is, irrespective of their ranks and positions in service.
“As far as we are concerned, minimum wage has not been implemented in Kebbi State and we are asking the governor to go back to the negotiation table and do the right thing. If he fails to do this, we will meet and give an appropriate directive to our members to withdraw their services. You cannot deceive anyone at this stage.”
The JNPSNC Secretary accused some state governments of exhibiting an indifferent attitude to the issue of the minimum wage.
“What we have observed is that most state governments are lazy in their attitude towards the minimum wage issue. Immediately the bill was signed into law and negotiations began at the national level, we expected the states to start looking at their revenue base and what they are going to do.
“When the agreement was signed at the national level, we also expected the states to look at the new wage table and see how their states will fare. But some of them just looked at the figure without taking the necessary steps,” he said.
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Lawal said the organised labour will write again to the government of the defaulting states to commence and conclude negotiations before December 31.
He also said the JNPSNC at the national level had split into smaller groups to be able to effectively monitor the negotiations at the state level.
He added that organised labour would judge the sincerity of each state government on merit before deciding its next line of actions in states that fail to meet up with its stipulated deadline.
He said, “To monitor what is going on in the states properly, we have divided ourselves into groups so that we can quickly and easily intervene in states where there is deadlock.
“The deadline is December 31, 2019 for all negotiations to be completed and for employees to get their money from their state governments.
“But if for one reason or the other there is the sincerity of purpose in the attitude of a state government and negotiation drags beyond the date, we will judge the situation based on its merit. But in a situation where negotiations have not even started at all by that date, you can be assured that we will react in such states.
“Once we are in the first week of December and we are not getting the expected signal, we will write the concerned states and remind them of the deadline. We can then move in and deal with such recalcitrant state.”
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