The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) says it will shut down the economy for one month if the National Assembly decentralizes the minimum wage.
At the Nigeria Employers' Consultative Association (NECA) annual general meeting in Lagos on Tuesday, Joe Ajaero, the president of the NLC, gave a speech stating that organized labor will resist the moving of the minimum wage from the exclusive legislative list to the concurrent list.
“As we are here, a joint committee of the Senate, House of Representatives, and the judiciary are meeting,” he said.
“They have decided to remove section 34 from the exclusive legislative list to the concurrent list so that the state governors can determine what to pay you and so that there will be no minimum wage again.”
Ajaero said workers would not accept governors foisting "slave wage" on them.
“Organised labor will not accept it,” he warned.
Nigeria's federalism is structured in a way that classes items and policies into exclusive and concurrent legislative lists.
The federal government implements items in the exclusive list without the leeway for states to tamper with them.
States are, however, free to amend items in the concurrent list.
New National Minimum Wage
On Thursday, the federal government approved ₦70,000 as the new minimum wage for workers in Nigeria.
President Bola Tinubu announced the new minimum wage at a meeting with leaders of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC).
