The Trade Union Congress of Nigeria has rejected the introduction of another wage award, calling instead for a sustainable salary increase to improve workers’ welfare and purchasing power.
The position was outlined in a communiqué signed by the TUC Secretary-General, Nuhu Toro, after an emergency meeting of its National Administrative Council. The News Agency of Nigeria reported the development on Thursday.
The union said another temporary intervention would not sufficiently address workers’ financial difficulties, stressing that a permanent salary increase was needed to improve their living conditions.
The TUC said its demand for a salary increase was driven by the Federal Government’s failure to fully implement the 2023 wage award agreement reached with organised labour.
According to Toro, the agreement, signed on October 2, 2023, provided for a wage award as temporary relief for workers pending the enactment of a new national minimum wage on July 29, 2024.
“The Congress is demanding a salary increase and not another wage award,” he said.
However, workers received an average of only three months’ payments out of the 10 months stipulated in the agreement.
He argued that introducing another wage award would offer only temporary relief, rather than the lasting intervention needed to strengthen workers’ purchasing power and improve their living conditions.
He also emphasised that the national minimum wage serves as the statutory baseline for workers’ earnings and should not be regarded as a ceiling restricting further salary negotiations.
The Congress said its position aligned with that of its public-sector affiliates, including the Senior Staff Association of Universities, Teaching Hospitals, Research Institutes and Associated Institutions, the National Union of Allied Health Professionals and the Senior Staff Association of Statutory Corporations and Government Owned Companies.
The union’s latest stance follows concerns over the implementation of the previous wage award agreed upon by the Federal Government and organised labour in October 2023.
In its earlier account of the dispute, the TUC said some workers were still owed one or two months of the allowance, while others received no payment at all. It added that some employees received up to four months of the N40,000 award, but payments were irregular, with gaps of one or two months.
The union also claimed that more than 80 per cent of state governments and employers in the informal sector failed to implement any form of wage award.
It maintained that permanent salary adjustments would offer workers more reliable financial relief than temporary payments, which were often inconsistently implemented.
