Minister of Labour and
Employment, Dr Chris Ngige, on Wednesday, restated federal government’s stance
on the new minimum wage.
He spoke at the Presidential
Villa, Abuja, while briefing State House correspondents after the Federal
Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The minister said the N24,000 per
month stands, a figure the organised labour has kicked against.
He said that once minimum wage
was fixed, any organisation or state that had the capacity to pay more could do
that.
Ngige cited that Edo, Delta and
Lagos states paid their workers more than the current N18, 000 national minimum
wage.
He disclosed that FEC approved
the implementation of the no-work, no pay principle when workers go on strike
in the federal public service.
The minister said that the
technical committee, which was inaugurated on April 27, 2016, did their work
and submitted to the FEC in Oct. 2017.
“FEC in turn, empanelled a
committee of ten which I chaired to do a government Draft White Paper on those
contentious areas that the technical committee had looked at.
“These contentious areas are
enforcement of section 43 of the Trade Dispute Act Law of the Federation 2004;
this is the section that deals with lockout of workers by their employers
without declaring redundancy appropriately.
“Because in some establishments,
especially in the private sector, workers are locked out by their employers; so
the law there says that if you lock your workers without passing through the
normal channel-due process.
“For the period of the lock out,
the worker is assumed to be at work and will receive all the remunerations and
allowances, benefits accruing to him for the period and that period will also
be counted for him as a pensionable period in the computation of his pension.
“But when workers go on strike,
the principle of no-work-no-pay will also apply because that principle is
enshrined in the same section 43 of the Labour Act,’’ he said.
According to Ngige, the section
says that for the period a worker withdraws his services, government or his
employers are not entitled to pay.
The minister said that under the
section, the period for which the worker was absent would not count as part of
his pensionable period in the public service.
Ngige added that the issue of
public servants remaining permanently in the executive bodies on trade unions
was discussed.
His words: “Government realises
that some persons in the public service go into trade union executive
positions; hold offices; and they do that for life; for as long as they are in
the service.
“In doing so, they will refuse
postings and deployments under the guise that are doing trade union activities;
government says no.
“You have to be a public servant
first before you become a trade unionist; therefore, if you are there; the
public service rules will also apply to you.
“And in furtherance to this,
government has also said that there must tenure stipulations because people
stay there without tenure; many organisations give people union positions
without tenure; government says there is no office that does not have tenure.’’
Ngige said that trade unions,
henceforth, should present constitutions that must have tenures; at least,
maximum of two tenures for any elective position.
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