If after tomorrow, we have not seen any tangible response from the government, the organs of the Organised Labour will meet to decide on what next.”
By Deborah Hassan
365Daily – Organised Labour may resume its suspended strike as it has rejected the ₦62,000 or ₦100,000 “starvation” minimum wage being offered by the federal government for Nigerian workers.
An Assistant General Secretary of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Chris Onyeka, said they are not going to go lesser that its latest demand of ₦250,000 agreed at the last meeting of the Tripartite Committee on Minimum Wage on Friday, June 7, 2024.
He added that this is the living wage that is acceptable for an average Nigerian worker.
“Our position is very clear,” he said on Monday, June 10, 2025, while appearing on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief show.
“We have never considered accepting N62,000 or any other wage that we know is below what we know is able to take Nigerian workers home. We will not negotiate a starvation wage.
“We have never contemplated N100,000 let alone of N62,000. We are still at N250,000, that is where we are, and that is what we considered enough concession to the government and the other social partners in this particular situation. We are not just driven by frivolities but the realities of the market place; realities of things we buy every day: bag of rice, yam, garri, and all of that.”
Onyeka noted that the one-week grace period given to the Federal Government last Tuesday, June 4, 2024, will expire at midnight of Tuesday, June 11, 2024, so the Federal Government and National Assembly has tomorrow (Tuesday) to meet the demands of the unions.
Failure to do so, he continued, would result in the organs of the NLC and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) meeting to decide on the resumption of the suspended nationwide industrial action.
“The Federal Government and the National Assembly have the call now. It is not our call. Our demand is there for them (the government) to look at and send an Executive Bill to the National Assembly, and for the National Assembly to look at what we have demanded, the various fact of the law, and then come up with a National Minimum Act that meets our demands.
“If that does not meet our demand, we have given the Federal Government a one-week notice to look at the issues and that one week expires tomorrow (Tuesday). If after tomorrow, we have not seen any tangible response from the government, the organs of the Organised Labour will meet to decide on what next,” he stated.
“It was clear what we said. We said we are relaxing a nationwide indefinite strike. It’s like putting a pause on it. So, if you put a pause on something and that organs that govern us as trade unions decide that we should remove that pause, it means that we go back to what was in existence before.”