Joe Ajaero, the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), has demanded that members of the House of Representatives and senators perform part-time jobs and receive the minimum wage.
According to Joe Ajaero, if National Assembly members were paid the same minimum pay as workers in other professions, they would pass legislation improving the minimum wage for all workers.
Speaking at the Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association’s (NECA) 67th Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Lagos on Tuesday, the NLC president made this statement.
According to Ajaero, companies and employers would benefit from workers having a higher income. He predicted that workers will be able to purchase a greater number of products and services.
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He said unless the gap in wages between politicians and citizens are breached, the gap between the poor and the rich would remain apart.
“You cannot be in the Senate and you are under minimum wage and not legislate for a better wage. We should know your wage, we should know what you are earning. If you are a governor, you have security vote that is unaccounted for. If you have excess funds, you will not know that people are suffering.
“But if everybody is brought under the minimum wage, even if the governors want to create level 18, 19, or 20 for them, they all should come under the wage system. That is the only way it is going to work.
“If it is possible, both the House of Representatives and the Senate should be on part-time basis.
“Let it be based on professional callings. If you are a lawyer, a doctor, you have a business or profession of your own. If they meet three times a week, then the remaining days in the week, you go on with your businesses because the money being spent at the National Assembly is unimaginable.
“Unless we address this, the country will continue to go down and the gap between the rich and poor will continue to widen,” Ajaero said.
He added that a fair wage is social justice, calling on NECA to join NLC in its demand for ₦250,000 for workers.
“Fair wages are not just a matter of social justice; they are also instrumental in boosting worker’s productivity and, consequently, the bottom line for employers. Enhanced purchasing power among workers will lead to increased consumption, thereby addressing the concerns of rising inventories in warehouses.
“We have advocated from the beginning of our engagement on the national minimum wage fixing exercise for the need to put more money in the hands of workers. We made this case on the understanding that it will help our businesses and rev up the economy.
“We had strongly believed that your organization would have been one with us and would have seen that we are actually making a great case for the survival of your businesses. We do not have any interest in crippling our businesses because you cannot cut your nose to spite your face.
“It is on this premise that we urge members of NECA to join us in the quest for a national minimum wage that will eliminate deep poverty from the lives of workers; wages that will not increase the number of the working poor and amount to a starvation wage for Nigerian workers is what we should all push for.
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“The only way to break the present consumer resistance is to increase the wages of workers and that speaks to the policy of government that seeks to reflate the economy. It is not by giving handouts or reducing Nigerians to beggars who must queue at the various charity parks before they can eat.
“We must join hands to stop this collective slide into the pit. We must save our businesses by saving workers. ₦250,000 as national minimum wage is already a steep consideration by Nigerian workers,” Ajaero added.
