- Some Federal Workers Grumble, Yet to Receive New Wage
- Labour Unions Demand Faster Implementation
November 03, (THEWILL) – The memo was dated Tuesday, October 22, 2024, but the story broke on Friday, November 1, 2024. It said that salary payments of civil servants in 12 Ministries, Departments and Agencies, MDAs, would face delays between October and December 2024.
According to the memo, which was addressed to the staff of the Voice of Nigeria, VON, the Director of Press at the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, Bawa Mokwa, who did not mention other MDAs affected , stated that the notice was, “consequent to the Federal Government’s implementation of the minimum wage in September 2024 and the non-inclusion of the 40 percent CONPSS Peculiar Allowance in the 2024 budget.” As a result, the Voice of Nigeria personnel budget has been exhausted. “VON’s personnel costs from the month of October to December 2024 will, therefore, have to be augmented from the Service Wide Vote,” he added.
Although 12 MDAs may appear small in number when compared to the 943 MDAs in the country, the memo implies that the implementation of the minimum wage at the federal level is beset with challenges. In fact, when THEWILL contacted some workers at VON, the response was revealing.
“You are not talking about payment of the old wage, you are asking about the new minimum wage?” a senior staff of the organisation told this newspaper on Friday. “This envelope system of funding the agency did not start today. It is always exhausting and we have to look for ways to argue about salaries.” Investigation shows that agencies like the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, are also affected. So too is the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, and the National Identity Management Commission, NIMC, to name a few.
While this story of delayed or staggered payment post-minimum wage is evolving at the national level, a similar scenario is playing out in many states across the country. Since President Tinubu signed the new national minimum wage of N70,000 into law on Monday, July 29, 2024, up from the previous N30,000, many states have expressed their willingness to either adopt the new wage or pay even higher wages. As at press time on Saturday afternoon, 27 state governors indicated interest in paying the minimum wage. They are Babajide Sanwo-Olu of
Lagos State; Mohammed Bago of Niger State; Peter Mbah of Enugu State; Duoye Diri of Bayelsa State; Alex Otti of Abia State; Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq of Kwara State; Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers State; Muhammed Yahaya of Gombe State; Ahmed Ododo of Kogi State; Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State; Godwin Obaseki of Edo State; Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom State; Charles Soludo of Anambra State; Dikko Radda of Katsina State; Frances Nwafiru of Ebonyi State; Ahmadu Fintiri of Adamawa State; Lucky Aiyedatiwa of Ondo State; Sheriff Oborevwori of Delta State; Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State; Seyi Makinde of Oyo State; Babagana Zulum of Borno State; Ademola Adeleke of Osun State; Hyacinth Alia of Benue State; Nasir Idris of Kebbi State; Uba Sani of Kaduna State; Abba Yusuf of Kano and Governor Umar Namadi of Jigawa State.
So far, only seven among these 27 states have started paying the new minimum wage as at October 2024. They are Lagos, Edo, Delta, Adamawa, Ogun and Kwara. Among the remaining 21 states that have announced their readiness to pay the wage, 16 have scheduled November as take- off date. They are Kano, Kebbi, Kaduna, Katsina, Niger, Jigawa, Gombe, Abia, Enugu, Anambra, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Ebonyi, Borno, Kogi and Rivers. The remaining five states, among those that have announced readiness to pay, have set up minimum wage committees. They are Oyo, Osun, Nasarawa, Ondo and Benue.
Among these states, 15 have offered to pay above the N70,000 minimum wage. They are Lagos, N85,000; Bayelsa, N80,000; Niger, N80,000; Delta, N75,500; Enugu, N80,000; Ebonyi, N75,000; Rivers, N85,000; Kogi, N72, 500; Ogun, N77,000; Gombe, N71,451, Kebbi, N75,000; Akwa Ibom, N80,000, Ondo N73, 000; Kaduna State N72,000 and Kano, N71,000.
Defaulting states where the new minimum wage is yet to be set are Plateau, Sokoto, Zamfara, Imo, Bauchi, Taraba, Ekiti, Cross Rivers and Yobe. The deciding factor for this indecisiveness on the part of some governors is lack of steady flow of revenue. States like Lagos, Rivers, Delta, for example, have hefty Internally Generated Revenue and complementary bigger Federal Accounts Allocation Committee, FAAC, collection, compared to states like Taraba, Kebbi, Ebonyi and Cross Rivers, which depend on federal allocations.
STATES WITH NO PLAN
These nine states -Plateau, Sokoto, Zamfara, Imo, Bauchi, Taraba, Ekiti, Cross Rivers and Yobe-that are yet to set up a
minimum wage committee or are about to do so with no clear picture of what would happen next on this matter.
As at press time, it was still unclear when the new minimum wage will become a reality in Plateau State.
A NULGE official in Plateau State, Yohanna Makwin simply told our Correspondent via phone that “negotiations are still going on”, but added quickly that “no worker will be ready to receive less than N70,000 as stipulated by the law no matter how the negotiations go”. He said the “negotiations” are basically to consider all “the consequential adjustments” that have to be made for the new salary regime to have meaning.
After the EndBadGovernance Protests of last August, while addressing the youth group who came to the Government House in Little Rayfield to present their demands to President through the State Governor, Caleb Mutfwang, among other things, maintained that the Plateau State Government will not be able to cope with the new minimum wage given its peculiar challenges and the subsisting economic realities. This led to the constitution of a committee to further negotiate with organized labour on a workable way forward.
Although a director in the Plateau civil service confirmed that “the committee is still working,” the state NLC Chairman, Eugene Manji, did not respond to calls to state the position of the NLC and the status of the continuing negotiations vis-a-vis the expectation of the workers.
The Cross River State Government has maintained a deafening silence on the new minimum wage. During this year’s Workers’ Day celebration at the U.J Esuene Stadium in Calabar, Governor Bassey Out proposed N40,000 as minimum wage to workers in the state. This was yet to be fully implemented in the state before President Tinubu signed the law on the new N70,000 in June.
During the presentation of this year’s budget of N498 billion on Thursday, October 30, the state government said nothing about the minimum wage. Its silence has however sparked concern among workers in the state and prompted the government to announce the committee for the implementation of the new minimum wage in the state.
According to the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Nsa Gill, Otu has approved the constitution of the joint public service negotiating and implementation committee on the new minimum wage and its consequential adjustment in the state.
“The committee will commence sitting any day from 1st November, 2024 subject to its convenience and round up on time to enable compliance in the state”, Gill said, adding that the 17-man committee will be chaired by the Head of Service, Obol Innocent Eteng, while the permanent secretary, Ministry of Establishment will serve as secretary.
Other members of the committee include a representative from the Trade Union Congress, Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees, Nigeria Labour Congress and Joint Negotiating Council. Responding to questions about delayed implementation, the Special Adviser to the governor on Labour Matters, Clarkson Otu, said that not all states have implemented the new wage. He said that by constituting the committee, the governor has done the first thing that ought to be done and what the committee comes up with would be made known to everyone.
Also, speaking, Otabe Obono Leko, the Cross River State president of the Nigerian Union of Local Government Employees, NULGE, said that though a time frame was not specified, he did not expect the committee’s activities to exceed two weeks.
On his part, Gregory Olayi, the state Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, said he just heard of the composition of the committee, saying that it was something the government ought to have done much earlier.
He said the new wage ought to have commenced in July and the NLC agreed it should start by October. He however welcomed the state government’s committee and said that once inaugurated, its template, time frame and the thorny issue of consequential adjustment would be thrashed out.
In Yobe, Governor Mai Mala Buni only a fortnight ago approved the constitution of a 10-member committee on the new National minimum wage with the Secretary to the State Government, Baba Malam Wali as the Committee’s Chairman, while the Head of the Civil Service is the Co-Chairman. “The Committee will also determine the financial implication of the implementation of the new minimum wage at the state and local government level, in addition to making recommendations for government consideration”, the Head of Civil Service, Hamidu M. Alhaji, said.
It was after Dauda Lawal became governor of Zamfara State that workers were not paid even the old N30,000 wage. He started paying in June 2024 and has made no commitment yet on the new minimum wage. In Bauchi State where the government inaugurated a tripartite technical committee to work out the procedure on the new wage, a date is yet to be fixed for the beginning of payment of the N70,000. NLC Chairman, Dauda Shu’aibu, confirmed that the state government had agreed to pay.
Governor Agbu Kefas of Taraba State casually mentioned, during a project inspection tour in Jalingo, the state capital on Thursday, that his government was committed to paying the minimum wage. Nothing more. In Benue State, Nigeria Labour Congress and the Trade Union Congress said that negotiation between labour and Benue State Government over the implementation of the national minimum wage is still ongoing.
The State NLC chairman, Comrade Terungwa Igbe in a telephone chat with our Correspondent in Makurdi simply said, “Negotiation is ongoing”. On his part, the State chairman of Trade Union Congress (TUC), Comrade Gidea Akaa, dispelled the rumour that the Benue State Government was planning to pay N40,000 as minimum wage.
According to him, TUC and the State Government negotiation is still on the negotiation table for a proposed wage increase of between N75,000 to N77,000. He pointed out that as soon as agreement was reached, the parties would sign for implementation.
ALL THAT GLITTERS NOT GOLD
Investigation by THEWILL shows that while a growing number of states are announcing their readiness to pay the minimum wage, many are also plotting to “pay what they are capable of paying” and thus open a window for industrial harmony in their respective states.
Anambra and Kwara States exhibit this trait in their dealings on the minimum wage. And the labour leaders are reacting robustly. Not pleased with the way the Anambra State Government had resorted to computing its own wages, labour leaders at the weekend rose from a meeting and called on Governor Charles Soludo to use the template as agreed by organised labour and the Federal Government. The Anambra chapter of the Nigerian Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), Anambra Chapter, Comrade Armeh Nicholas, made the appeal in Awka on Friday while addressing workers’ expectations from the new minimum wage. Aromeh said that organised labour in the state, comprising the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC), and NULGE, were collectively appealing to Soludo, in the interest of workers, to use the chart released by the Federal Government.
He said, “Yes, there is an issue of the new minimum wage on the ground and labour leaders, including NLC, TUC, and NULGE, have been meeting with the governor on the matter. In Anambra, unfortunately, the governor is not getting it right. Judging by what we have seen from him and his team, we are not happy.” Aromeh further stated that though the state government based its argument on internally generated revenue, available reports show that Anambra is not better than some states that have adopted the Federal Government’s template for the new minimum wage. Upon enquiry, the Commissioner for Information, Law Mefor told THEWILL on Saturday morning that he is yet to understand the point the labour leaders were making. “Have you seen the Federal Government’s template,”? he asked, “I have not seen it so I cannot verify the labour leaders’ claim.”
In the case of Kwara, organised labour demanded the immediate reversal of the new tax regime imposed on workers in the state following the implementation of the new minimum wage of N70,000. Organised labour expressed dismay that “the state government decided to start a notorious percentage tax deductible from workers’ salaries contrary to the negotiation it had with the government for tax relief for workers upon the payment of the new minimum wage.”
After a joint State Administrative Council (SAC) meeting of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) in Ilorin at the weekend, the labour leaders, in a joint statement, called for a downward review of the tax percentage on salaries of workers in the state. The NLC Chairman, Comrade Muritala Saheed Olayinka; his TUC counterpart, Comrade Olayinka Onikijipa; state Chairman, Coalition of Health Workers Union (COHESU), Comrade Isaac Bolatito; and state Chairman and Secretary, Joint Negotiation Council (JNC), Comrade Saliu Suleiman and Comrade Tunde Joseph lamented that the state government was selective in its implementation of the new wage. The statement reads in part, “The SAC of Joint Labour Centres met today to review the outcome of the new minimum wage payment to Kwara workers as approved by His Excellency, Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq. The committee observed with dismay the notorious percentage tax deducted from our members.
“This was at variance with government/labour discussion at the negotiation table for tax relief on added sum or status quo ante on the percentage tax deduction. The joint labour congress asked the state government to swiftly act on the demand of the labour to avert industrial disharmony.
Responding to the labour leader’s demand, Acting Head, Corporate Affairs Department of the Kwara State Internal Revenue Service (KWIRS), Funmilola Oguntunbi, said that the minimum wage implementation and statutory deductions are in accordance with legal obligations. She added that “the gross income of workers is subject to statutory deductions, including Personal Income Tax, pension contributions, National Health Insurance Schemes(NHIS), National Housing Fund (NHF), and insurance, where applicable.”
Oguntunbi said that if the deductions were not made, the state government would be unable to generate Internally Generated Revenue needed for developmental projects and employees’ personal obligations.
The joint labour congress asked the state government to swiftly act on the demand of the labour to avert industrial disharmony. Moreover, the Nigeria Union of Teachers claim that N1,000 was being deducted from the salary monthly since the implementation of the new wage Rafiu Ajakaiye, Chief Press Secretary to the gov ernor told THEWILL that what may look as differences between the government and labour over the minimum wage is actually a matter of interest.
He said, “Trade union is an amalgam propelled by interest, they are driven by their own interest, which is okay. The government also has a larger duty to address the larger interest of the state and the citizens. Government does not have any problem with the union. Whatever was implemented at the level of the minimum wage was what was agreed at the level of negotiation. The government is implementing the N70,000 minimum wage and the consequential component of it which was agreed by the minimum wage committee which the labour leaders were party to. On the tax issue, the Internal Revenue Agency issue has issued a statement clarifying the issue of PAYE, (Pay As You Earn), which shows that the government has not done anything unusual, just like it has been done in other states. On the deduction of N1,000 monthly as claimed by the NUT, the government can only act as an arbiter. It is an issue between teachers and the labour. The issue has come to the attention of the government and it is being looked into.”
In another instance, some states have jumped on the minimum wage announcement bandwagon while their minimum wage committee is stalemated in the attempt to pressurise labour into negotiating a flexible wage regime. Ondo State is a major example. Giving reasons for the delay in minimum wage implementation last week, the Head of Service, Mr. Bayo Philip, said the delay was due to the ongoing preparation of the consequential adjustment table by the technical committee.
According to him, the “Committee saddled with the preparation of the consequential adjustment has been working round the clock to ensure that whatever salary table that is approved would be sustainable and not affect the government’s resources in attending to other critical public issues.”
Ogun State government begun payment of the N77,000 new minimum wage to workers in the state last week. Some workers, who spoke anonymously, told THEWILL on Friday that the government began the payment last Thursday.
“They have begun the payment, they started yesterday and I am sure everything would have gone rounded up before the weekend” one of the state workers said. Contacted for comments, the Special Adviser on Media and Strategy to the Governor, Mr Kayode Akinmade, gave the assurance that the state government would soon commence payment.
He stated that since Governor Dapo Abiodun made the pledge at a meeting with Labour leaders in the state, including the State Chairman of Nigeria Labour Congress(NLC) Comrade Hammed- Benco and his Trade Union Congress(TUC), counterpart, Comrade Akeem Lasisi, as well as the Head of the Service in the state, Mr Kehinde Onasanya, about a week ago, the payment would soon commence.
“The pronunciation was just made about a week ago. When the announcement was made, the SSG, the Head Service and labour leaders were there, it was a collective decision. What is necessary is to work on the modalities of the payment. What is necessary is that the deadline has been met and I know our people will begin to enjoy the adjustment of the new wages” Akinmade stressed. The NLC Chairman, Comrade Lasisi while reacting on Wednesday expressed confidence that the state government would pay workers.
NLC REACTS
The Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, said it is aware of what is going on across the states regarding the implementation of the new wage and has scheduled a National Executive Council NEC meeting this week for the purpose of making an overall assessment before taking the next step. The General Secretary of the NLC, Mr Emmanuel Ugboaja told THEWILL on Friday that the union has called a NEC meeting for Port Harcourt this week.
He said, “First, let me state that we did not have any understanding with any governor that they must pay the new wage by October. It was a self-imposed deadline that we thought we needed to operate with and on the strength of that we have called our National Executive Council meeting for Port Harcourt next week to take the pulse of our 36 states chapters including FCT, Abuja, on the implementation of the new minimum wage in their various states. It is at the end of that meeting that we can now take a position. We will know those states that implemented the new wage in line with the agreed template, those that have not. We expect every chairperson to come with a report on the operational template the states are using, review it and see if it is making sense.” On the lack of implementation of the new wage at some Federal Government agencies, Ugboaja said that it will not be from lack of approval but “the stupidity of whoever is the Chief Executive of such an agency.”
He said, “There is no doubt that the Federal Government has committed to paying the minimum wage. It has done its consequential adjustment template. Any MDA that is not implementing it is not as a result of approval. In any case, there is no agency that does not have an affiliate of the NLC or TUC operating there, so we expect to also get reports from them at the Port Harcourt meeting. When we hear of such infringement we will take it up with the agency because the Secretary to the Federal, Ministers of Finance and Budget and Planning are all aware of the government’s approval.”
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Amos Esele is the Editor of THEWILL Newspaper. He has over two decades of experience on the job.
THEWILL Correspondent, Aniekan Bassey has over six years experience that spans across several fields in print journalism including development communication, sexual reproductive and health rights issues, crime, climate change, social justice, business and human interest stories.
Sunday Ogbu is a professional journalist with eight - twelve years experience that had worked with various print and online media. Sunday specializes in news reporting with the aim of educating his readers on current social, political and economic occurences within his area of coverage. Sunday is a strong force to work with in the media industry and uses his positive attitude and tireless energy to encourage others to work hard and succeed. Sunday is inspired daily by his wife and their four children. In his free time, Sunday likes sight-seeing, reading and discussing issues of societal interest.
