The minister of Labour and Employments, Chris Ngige said Thursday in Abuja that private sector workers will benefit from the new minimum wage when fully implemented. The minister made the comment when he played host to delegates from the United Labour Congress (ULC).
“They say that time heals wounds, for me I think the time has healed most of the wounds in the labour industry. Visa vice government, unions, and employers. From that negotiation also, there was recommendations for the negotiation of the minimum wage which at the time was 18,000.”
“Today, we have a minimum wage law. So at any point in time, let nobody shun social dialogue”.
The Labour minister further stated that for the private sector to benefit from this scheme, there must be unionization in the sector. He said
“I was excited seating here to hear that you are unionizing people including teachers in private schools. That is novel because some of them have come to me to complain that there are been paid Pitas. I have the case of a relative who studied electrical electronics and graduated with a second class upper. I encouraged him to go and do further certificate course in one of the institution manned by the ministry of power. He scored distinction in the subjects he took, he went to write exams for employment in oil and gas companies and even in transmission company of Nigeria. While waiting, no job so he got a private school where he is teaching mathematics and physics and they are paying him 15,000 a month. So I’m in the know about the unfair labour practice, but how can he complain? There is no unionization there. If he refuses or walks out of the job, another person will gladly take it. So it is when we have unions that this kind of unfair labour practice will be brought to the attention of the authority and the employer so concerned will be forced to comply to set standards.
On allegations of his ministry bridging section 40 of the constitution that deals on freedom of association, he said
“we have not bridged section 40 of the constitution and we will never bridge it. Freedom to form associations, freedom to form political parties. If there is no freedom to form political parties, I won’t be seating here with you as your Minister. But I’m a product of a political party”.
“Through section 40, most of you too are officers of your various unions. The only area now where we have some misunderstanding is the process for you to become a federation. I am happy that your president has confessed that this particular law, section 35 of the Trade Union Act has brought out the best in you, and that best is that you are now unionizing people in the informal sector which hitherto everybody had ignored”. Senator Ngige insisted that registration of labour Unions must be done within the confines of the law
“I am not saying that you wont be registered, but that must be done within the confines of the law. The only thing you need to do is conform to that aspect of the law that gives you the mandate to be automatically registered with 12 brand unions to be in your membership. “I’m also told you have 8 brand unions in your kitty. We are registering brand unions but we must make sure they conform to the process for registration“.
The minister also intimated that some of the Nigerian labour laws will need to be reviewed
“I agree with you that some of our labour laws will need to be amended, but until there are amended, they remain the extant regulations or law, all and sundry will have to obey
On the issue of increased unemployment in Nigeria, the minister said government was spending sleepless nights in ensuring that the right thing is done
“On the issue of expertrates quotas and foreigners taking jobs that are due for Nigerians. The two things to tackle in this next level administration are as follows: first, at the federal executive council, we have agreed that any contract that is being done for the Federal government of Nigeria must specify the number of jobs that are being created for Nigerians. We went further to say if the company has foreign needs, they should also indicate what quantum of foreign jobs are available. This is our way of creating more jobs for Nigerian professionals. Secondly is the local contents which also specified that the jobs must have Nigeria human and resources contents”.
All the unions should create inspectorate department which will work hand in hand with the inspectorate department of the federal ministry of Labour and Employment and all the states. All Directors are directed in this dimension to work with you, go into factories, companies and industries with a view to looking at the books which will show staff disposition. They will also show what salaries people are earning. With that, we will be able to know if Nigerians are not underpaid and to ensure that minimum wage and consequential adjustments is implemented.
“This will also help us in checking casualization and contracts staff. We will make sure the terms are not inimical to the workers”
“The demand for 500 billion which the consequential adjustment represent is not sustainable. If you push government to accent to what is not sustainable, then you are asking government to retrench workers so that the few that are remaining will get this big big money, we don’t want that to happen.
However, leader of the delegation, Comrade Joe Ajaero appealed to the Labour Minister to fast track the process of registration of United Labour Congress (ULC) whom according to him is due for recognition as a Labour federation as this will better the lot of Nigerian workers
“The stigma of ULC not being registered has been on for a long time by those who don’t want the progress of our union. A labour centre is a collage of trade unions, and the trade unions own the centre. The centre doesn’t own the unions, the unions come together to form a centre and they fund it. That is exactly what we have done. We have had challenge of registration or no registration because of an alleged law which says, if I’m a Catholic today, tomorrow I can’t be a Pentecostal, it is only in the ministry of labour that I’m hearing that and I’m happy that a SAN is here to tell us whether I cannot be who I want to be”
“The law was equally clear that 12 unions can form a federation and up till now we are more than 18 to 20 unions and they say there is a law that says you can’t leave where you are”.
“Honourable Minister sir, let me equally appeal to the ministry to continue it good work to see that this new minimum wage is implemented for the benefits of the Nigerian workers. If this is implemented in the public sector, I want to plead with you to see what is happening in the private sector. Most of the unions in ULC are operating from the private sector. We are indeed suffering. We have been fighting for salary reviews in the private sector to no avail. As they are talking about consequential adjustment, I want us to look at that critically so that when the private sector runs to you, I want you to give us justice as ever”.
“Unions merge, unions equally divorce. The issue of non divorce in the union must be given due consideration especially given what is contained in section 40 of the constitution which has to do with our rights to belong to any organization and if there is any law that is in conflict with the constitution, sir you are in a better position to interpret such sections”.
“If you watch over the years, we have not challenge the process, we believed that you should look into the books and see what is happening. It’s not something we should be dragging ourselves to the law courts”,
“I want to say our problems are many and that is why we are trying to have our organization licensed so that we can go into these problems holistically”.
