NLC President proposes N1m minimum wage to reflect economic hardship

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President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Joe Ajaero, has urged the administration led by President Bola Tinubu to set the new minimum wage for workers at N1 million, citing the worsening economy.

Ajaero said in an Arise Television interview, stating that this demand aligns with the escalating inflation and the depreciation of the naira in the country.

“This N1 million may be relevant if the value of the Nigerian (naira) continues to depreciate and if the inflation is not checked because the demand of labour is equally dependent on what is happening in the society,” Ajaero said.

“You will remember that by the time we were contemplating N200,000, the exchange rate was about N800/N900. As we talk today, the exchange rate is about N1,400 or even more.

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“Those are the issues that determine the demand and it is equally affecting the cost of living. And we had always said it that our demand will be based on cost of living index.

“You will agree with me today that even a bag of rice is going for about N60,000/N70,000 or more. A bag of even locally produced corn is about N56,000 or more.

“Foodstuff is getting out of reach. Now are we going to get a minimum wage that will not be enough for transportation even for one week?

“You have to factor in all these issues and that will determine the federal government’s commitment to this negotiation.

“It is not just that they want to give us minimum wage. The old minimum wage will be expiring by April and ordinarily, the federal government ought to have set up a committee six months before that time so that negotiation would have commenced.

“It appears we are going to work within one month or two to agree on a figure and I doubt how those ones are going to… especially when you look at the people that the federal government assembled as members of the committee.”

The country has been plunged into economic downturn since Tinubu removed fuel subsidy on May 29, 2023, followed by other policies such as the unification of offical and parallel foreign exchange market, among others.

This has caused the depreciation of naira against the US dollar forcing the rising high cost of living in the country.