President Bola Tinubu on Tuesday transmitted a national minimum wage bill to the National Assembly for consideration and passage.
In separate letters to the Senate and the House of Representatives, the President requested expedited review of the bill to amend the National Minimum Wage Act, 2019, proposing an increase in the National Minimum Wage from ₦30,000 to ₦70,000.
Additionally, the President asked lawmakers to reduce the interval for periodic reviews of the national minimum wage from five years to three years, along with related matters.
Last Thursday, President Tinubu and the leadership of the Organised Labour agreed on ₦70,000 as the new minimum wage for Nigerian workers.
Information Minister Mohammed Idris had said “the new national minimum that Mr President is expected to submit to the National Assembly is ₦70,000”.
The agreement between the government and labour representatives followed several weeks of discussions between labour leaders and President Tinubu, after months of unsuccessful negotiations between labour unions and a tripartite committee on minimum wage established by the President in January.
The committee, which included representatives from state and federal governments as well as the Organised Private Sector, had proposed a minimum wage of ₦62,000.
However, labour unions had demanded ₦250,000, arguing that the current ₦30,000 wage was unsustainable given inflation and the high cost of living resulting from the removal of the petrol subsidy.
Despite their initial demand for ₦250,000, Labour accepted the President’s offer of ₦70,000 last Thursday.
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) President, Joe Ajaero, noted that Labour accepted ₦70,000 while rejecting a proposal to increase the minimum wage to ₦250,000 contingent on raising petrol prices.
Labour agreed to the ₦70,000 offer partly because it included a reduction in the review interval from five years to three years.
The transmission of the wage bill occurred about six weeks after President Tinubu announced in his Democracy Day speech on June 12, 2024, that an executive bill for a new national minimum wage would be presented to the National Assembly for passage.