Buhari approves panel on salary review – TheNigerialawyer

President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered the setting up of a
Presidential Committee on Salaries and Wages to receive complaints
and review salaries, the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr
Chris Ngige, has said.

The President also directed that the negotiations of the
implementation of a new national minimum wage should be
fast-tracked.

But Ngige, who spoke with the leadership and members of the
Labour Correspondents Association of Nigeria in Abuja during a
courtesy visit on him, said Buhari was worried about the continued
delay in implementing the new minimum wage.

According to him, the continued delay is improper as state
governments are waiting for the negotiating team to complete its
job to avoid the government having to clear huge arrears after
concluding talks on the consequential adjustment.

Ngige said, “The President signed new minimum wage into law in
April; it is a pity that after signing it, May came and a lot of us
were sent on compulsory leave. We have now come back. If you
remember, a committee was set up and I was a member. When we left,
the Permanent Secretary took over and negotiated with the JNPSNC
(Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council) on the
consequential adjustment.

“The states are waiting for that and it is not proper for us not
to fast-track the negotiations for the states not to have too much
backlog to pay when the consequential adjustment is concluded.

“We have our own budget in the 2019 budget and we are going to
also budget for it in the 2020 budget. We are concerned about the
states because some of them are not proactive like us. So, the
sooner we conclude at the federal levels, and the JNPSNC takes it
from there and negotiate with the states, the better for
everybody.

“If we spill this into next year, I am not sure how many states
will be able to pay the backlog which will lead us to another round
of negotiations. It is the determination of the President and this
administration to fast-track the negotiations.”

The minister said he had received correspondence from the Chief
of Staff to the President “and we are putting a deadline to that
negotiations”.

Ngige said unemployment was one of the major reasons for the
growing security challenges facing in the country.

However, he said Buhari was committed to generating employment
by lifting no fewer than 100 million Nigerians out of poverty.

He said the ministry would come out with programmes to help the
government to recreate the middle class which, he said, had
vanished.

The minister said, “Even down there at the bottom, you still
have people who cannot be compartmentalised into the middle class.
Most of what we did in the ministry is to prevent job losses,
especially in the oil industry.”