Minimum wage: Why we accepted N70000,  preventing hike in petrol price — NLC

Following the agreement between the Organised Labour and President Bola Tinubu on a new national minimum wage, the President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Joe Ajaero, has disclosed that the Labour rejected an earlier proposal of N250,000 minimum wage and increase in petrol prices by President Tinubu.

Prestige News Online reports that the President, in a meeting with labour leaders on Thursday at the Presidential Villa, agreed to pay N70,000 as the new national minimum wage for workers.

Ajaero, while answering questions on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme on Thursday, shortly after Labour met with the President in Abuja, said the labour movement can make sacrifices without allowing Nigerians to suffer further on the increase in the petrol pump price.

“Accepting N70,000 was the best way to save Nigerians from further hardship,” he said.

“At last week’s meeting, the President brought a proposal that ‘I will give you guys ₦250,000’ if you allow me to equally increase the pump price of petroleum products’ and we said, ‘No, we need to go and consult’.

“Today, we went there to tell him, ‘No’. The labour movement can make sacrifices without allowing Nigerians to suffer further on the increase in the pump price of petroleum products.”

Recall that the president, in his inaugural on May 29, 2023, announced that the era of federal government subsidising Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), also known as petrol, is gone. The policy forced the pump price of petrol to jump from N184 per litre in May 2023 to over N700 at the moment.

According to Ajaero, the agreement for a three-year interval for the review of the new minimum wage for Nigerian workers also formed the basis of the Organised Labour’s agreement of N70,000 with the government.

President Tinubu is expected to send an executive bill to the National Assembly on the agreed rate for onward legislation.