Minimum wage: No state will pay less than N30,000 – NGF

The governors of the 36 States of the federation say they will not backtrack on their decision to pay the N30,000 minimum wage, describing it as “a settled matter”.

The chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum and governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, said this Wednesday night while fielding questions from journalists after a meeting of the forum in Abuja.

Fayemi said what remained was the need for states to renegotiate in terms of the consequential implication since “fingers are not equal”.

He said: “Minimum wage was not on our agenda because it is a settled matter and governors have all indicated without any equivocation that we subscribed to the Act of parliament that has been passed on the national minimum wage of N30,000. There is no debate. We have accepted that.

The negotiation thing you are talking is about the consequential impact of the minimum wage on the higher level. Each state has started that process.

“If the Nigeria Labour Congress is not fully aware of the status of the negotiation in the various states, we will be happy to share the information available to us with them. But as far as we are concern, there is no decision from the Governors Forum to backtrack; we are not backtracking on the minimum wage.

“However, fingers are not equal, states have to renegotiate in terms of the consequential implication for the others. Some states maybe in the position to pay N50,000, what we can tell you is that no state will pay less than N30,000 when we finally get to that point.”