NLC has demanded that workers’ salaries be reviewed

In a meeting held at Abuja for the Nation Public Service Negotiating Councils, President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Ayuba Wabba, has implored the Federal Civil Service to review salaries and welfare of public servants. 

The meeting was attended by several dignitaries including the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Folasade Yemi-Esan. 

The NLC president praised the Federal Government for enacting the N30,000 minimum wage. 

“Minimum wage is a service-wide issue. There’s a difference between the review of salaries and minimum wage in the public service” he said. 

“The civil servants, particularly those in the core ministries, departments and parastatals are actually the least paid. And I think we have every reason to try to encourage them because they are the drivers of government policies and programmes.” 

In response, the Federation’s Head of Civil Service stated that if salaries are raised, there may be consequences. 

She stated that during a meeting with Vice President Yemi Osibanjo last week, the latter “put a caveat that by the time we raise civil servants’ salaries, they must be ready to sit up and do the work that is expected of them, because there will be sanctions and repercussions, we must be aware of this.” 

Folasade mentioned that the government has formed a committee to harmonise the pay of both public and Civil officials. 

She also mentioned that the committee was also saddled with the responsibility of comparing what the private and public sector workers earned to forestall short-changing public sector workers.