The leadership of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) has insisted on going ahead with the nationwide strike slated for today, Monday.
Information Nigeria reports that Senate President Godswill Akpabio and Tajudeen Abbas, Speaker of the House of Representatives, conveyed a last-minute meeting on Sunday to avert the proposed indefinite strike by organised labour over the minimum wage and electricity tariff hike.
Joe Ajaero, President of the NLC, and his TUC counterpart, Festus Osifo, led other union leaders to the meeting.
At the end of the meeting, the labour bodies said they would meet and discuss the appeal made by the leadership of the National Assembly to suspend the proposed strike and allow for more dialogue with their organs before taking a decision.
Osifo who briefed journalists on the outcome of the meeting which lasted over four hours, said there was an appeal by Akpabio to the Unions to suspend the planned strike.
He said: “Yes, we have had a conversation, we have had a meeting, and the issues were laid bare for the part of government and what issues are on the part of the organized labour.
“There was an appeal from the senate president for us to call off the industrial action tonight. But on our path, we said that we have heard him.
“It is not possible for us to sit here and call off any industrial action because there are conditions and precedents given to us by our NEC.
“We would have been much more happier if this evening we had a great understanding that by tomorrow morning we would sign off on issues bordering on the minimum wage.
“Because, as at the last meeting, we were very very close to signing off — I mean, close in the sense that if the figures were right, it’s just to prepare the report and sign, so it’s not something that is that lengthy anymore.
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“But we have listened to them; we would take all their pleas to our organs, and we would have an organ’s meeting, taking what they have promised and the pleas that they have made to our organs.
“For now, we don’t have the powers to call off the industrial action, so the industrial action will continue while we have a conversation with our respective organs as soon as possible to lay bare what they have put forward and what they have proposed.”
On Friday, NLC and TUC declared an indefinite strike over the federal government’s refusal to increase the minimum wage from N60,000 to N494,000.
The labour unions had initially proposed N615,500 as the minimum wage, citing the high cost of living.
However, the Federal Government rejected the N615,500 proposal and offered N48,000 of which the NLC and TUC rejected on May 15.
On May 21, the federal government increased the proposed minimum wage to N54,000, which the labour again rejected and described as “unacceptable.”
Again, the Federal Government proposed N60,000, and it was rejected.
In a post shared on X after the meeting, the Speaker of the House, thanked the leaders of the labour unions for agreeing to attend the sit-down.
Abbas posted: “As part of our efforts to intervene between the Executive arm of the Federal Government and the organized labour, we, the leaders of the National Assembly, met with them today, especially in view of the planned nationwide industrial action by the latter.
“We appealed to the organized labour to see reason with the government and shelve the planned industrial action.
“I also reiterated my stand that the government could eradicate corruption in public offices by paying the workers a ‘living wage.’
“But we must admit that the government cannot fix all the perennial issues concerning wages and salaries all at once. We thanked the organised labour for accepting to attended the meeting, to assure Nigerians and the government that hope that all is not lost.”
