The governors have been issued a two-week deadline by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) to commence negotiations on the N35,000 wage award for workers in their states.
The demands are being made by organised labour unions in accordance with the Memorandum of Understanding terms that the federal government signed.
NLC and TUC state chapters disclosed on Tuesday that they have written to governors asking them to expedite the required procedures and execute the award intended to ease the pain of subsidy removal.
The deadline for making the wage award payment would elaspe in the next two weeks, according to the unions.
Recall that the national leadership of the NLC and TUC on October 1 reached an agreement with the FG to pay N35,000 to all federal workers beginning from September, pending when a new national minimum wage is expected to have been signed into law.
The resolution provided that the wage award would be paid to the federal workers for six months while states were encouraged to extend the same benefit to their workers.
Labour had cancelled its nationwide strike scheduled for the 3rd of October, 2023 with the promise that wage awards would be implemented within 30 days effective from the day the MoU was signed.
The Kano State NLC Chairman, Kabiru Inuwa speaking with Punch revealed he had written to the state government to demand the immediate implementation of the N35,000 wage award in the state.
Inuwa said, “We have written to the government requesting for the payment of the wage award to workers in the state and we are still waiting for the government to respond.”
He noted that the deadline given by the NLC to the federal and state governments to implement the wage award and other welfare packages for the workers would soon expire.
He expressed the hope that the state government would pay the wage award before the expiration of the deadline.
Inuwa added, “The ultimatum given to both state and federal governments will expire by the end of this month, so we hope the government will start the payment before the end of the deadline.”
The Gombe State NLC Secretary, Ibrahim Fika, on his part, said the 30-day ultimatum, which is now remaining two weeks, applied to workers in state governments.
He said, “The ultimatum says the state councils should negotiate with the state government. So it applies to us.”
Ada Peter
