Nigeria: Minimum Wage – Now Elections Are Over

28 June 2011

editorial

We predicted the Minimum Wage Act was more of political gimmick to rein in workers’ votes. The elections were too close for anyone to oppose labour openly.

Now that the elections are over, the reality of paying a meagre N18,000 monthly is dawning on the states, whose governors are presenting conditions for obeying the law. The Governors’ Forum wants the Federal Government to remove subsidy on petrol to free more resources to the states to meet the new wage bill.

They imagine that the chaos this will cause will be enough reason for postponement of implementation of the law. The price of fuel is the most contentious issue in government-peoples relations. In more than 25 years of debates on prices of petroleum products, the arguments have been lost in bogus costs government has amassed around importation of products.

A more pertinent position that the refineries should work and new ones built (which will also create jobs and jump start petro-chemical industries) do not enjoy any attention of government.

Proposals that money government makes from increasing prices of products would be used in developing infrastructure remain conjectures 25 years after. Nobody believes governors would use any extra allocation for the benefit of their states. Their financial records do not support such attitude. What do they do with their monthly revenue allocations? Have extra allocations reflected in the development of the states? Why were governors mute during the three-year processes that produced the law?

The Minimum Wage Act is a law. Nobody negotiates the law — you obey it. Anyone who is in default of the law commits an offence. Governors, who refuse to implement the law will be in breach of their oath to obey the Constitution. Laws are not obeyed when they are convenient.

Labour is on the exclusive list. Part I of the Exclusive Legislative List of the 1999 Constitution, Item 34 which states, “Labour, including trade unions, industrial relations; conditions, safety and welfare of labour; industrial disputes; prescribing a national minimum wage for the Federation or any part thereof; and industrial arbitration,” means the Minimum Wage Act is a federal law.

Governors are victims of their selfishness. They were falling over legislators to amend the Constitution to hold elections — so they can hold office — while neglecting provisions of the Constitution that could give them more powers to manage their resources.

Why should states pay uniform wages, especially when their abilities are not even? These arguments if made forcefully before the signing of the law, could have resulted in amendment of relevant portions of the Constitution, but for the governors, nothing was more important than the elections.

Minimum wage battles ahead will again remind Nigerians that more sections of the Constitution require amendment if states are to be more productive. Governors will be tasked in paying these wages and meeting their states’ other obligations.

Governors should not expect any sympathies. There is too much waste in governments and people expect that a little prudence will produce the funds to meet the minimum wage. The ordinary people have sacrificed for long, it is time for governments to make sacrifices in deeds.

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