The air in Nigeria right now is choky. There is a mixture of anger, trepidation, caution, and uncertainty. Tomorrow is pregnant. The state governors are spotting red eyes over the new minimum wage. Fear is in the air as a babel of voices trails the planned protest in August. Political thugs/hoodlums are now being demonised. All eyes are on the Federal Government to halt the conflagration.
Governors hiding behind a finger…
With the passing of the new Minimum Wage Bill Tuesday by the bicameral National Assembly, payment of the approved N70,000 has become binding on the federal, state, and other employers of labour.
“The reason for the pressure was to make it possible for the state governments to set their own minimum wage independently.”
Since last week, when President Bola Ahmed Tinubu approved the new amount, many state governors have been kicking. Only a few of them have spoken up that they would pay their workers the N70,000 minimum wage.
Read also: New minimum wage can’t feed a family of three
Before the passage of the bill Tuesday, there were indications that pressure was mounting on the federal legislature to remove Section 34 (of the Constitution that talked about minimum wage) from the Exclusive Legislative List to the Concurrent List.
The reason for the pressure was to make it possible for the state governments to set their own minimum wage independently.
Fixing the minimum wage is a constitutional issue in Nigeria. The current constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria made fixing the national minimum wage an item in the exclusive list. Therefore, it can only be legislated upon by the National Assembly and not the state assemblies.
The argument by many state governors complaining of inability to pay on account of the challenging economy has been described by many Nigerians as flippant.
Read also: UPDATED: Senate passes N70k minimum wage bill into law
Many analysts strongly believe that every state in Nigeria can pay the N70,000 minimum wage, as there is no state that does not have a comparative advantage in one area or the other.
Even states that hitherto said they were not well-endowed with resources are discovering lately that they have so many mineral deposits and other endowments that can help them shore up their internally generated revenues (IGR).
Rather than moaning, state governments have been urged to rather look inward and be more creative. They must redefine things. Some of their peers are already doing great things in that regard.
They should borrow a leaf from the Edo State government that grew its IGR by over 40 percent in 2023, recording a N17 billion increase from the N45 billion generated in 2022. The state hit N62 billion last year. For 2024, the state projected a whopping N72 billion!
The state has since pegged its minimum wage at N70,000 even before the Federal Government arrived at that figure. Edo achieved all these, despite a challenging economic crisis exacerbated by the removal of fuel subsidies.
Apart from Edo, a number of other states have also said they would pay the new minimum wage. They are Osun State, Benue State, Nasarawa State, Akwa Ibom State, Enugu State, and Oyo State.
Other states that are still kicking against the new minimum wage and shedding crocodile tears should go to Edo State and ask Governor Godwin Obaseki how he is doing it.
Many observers have said that it is not about not being able to afford the money to pay, but the willingness is lacking. State governments have always complained about the difficulty in paying salaries, whereas they focus on too many irrelevant things that consume money.
It has severally been said in many quarters that even if the minimum wage should be brought down to N20,000 today, there are still some governors that would not be willing to pay.
Joe Ajaero, president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), said: “As for the governors, we are watching their actions. Even with the N30,000 old minimum wage, not more than 23 out of the 36 states have been able to implement payment after five years of its enactment.”
It is annoying to many citizens that despite the huge increase in allocation from the Federal Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) to the states since the removal of the fuel subsidy, many governors are still complaining about salary payments.
With the passing of the bill waiting for the President’s assent, it is not optional for any governor to pay or not to pay. If a governor breaks the law by refusing to pay, the system must find a way to compel such a governor into obedience.
Halting the conflagration
It is a desperate moment right now in Nigeria. Nobody is smiling. One of the news items dominating news holes in the country right now is the call by the government on the Nigerian youths to step down their plan to protest the economic situation in the country.
While the government is right to advise, many observers believe that the overhyping of the planned protest may be dangerous for the country.
They believe that the way the government is going about it with threats and intimidation could even aggravate things. Protests, they argue, are part of people’s right to air their grievances over actions or inactions of the government.
What is expected of the government in such situations, like a number of senior lawyers, including Femi Falana, have said, is the provision of security to ensure that such gatherings are not hijacked by dangerous elements.
Many observers have likened the efforts of the Federal Government to spanking a child and hushing that child from crying.
Some observers have also said that the so-much noise being made about the planned protest, particularly from the government, may have conferred importance on such plans. If the government had decided to dialogue with the identified real planners (not those who may have been tagged by strokes of propaganda), there could have been an understanding.
A few days ago, Joe Ajero, NLC president, had advised President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to dismiss the notion that the planned protest was politically motivated.
“It is therefore condescending and dismissive to describe the daily brutish ordeal that Nigerians are going through as a sponsored political dissent,” Ajaero said.
It is still some days until August 1, 2024, and the President has enough time to nip-in-the-bud whatever is being feared that could go wrong if the protest happens.
It may be dangerous to wait until the “Ides of March ” comes. Caesar waited and arrogantly said to the Soothsayer that very morning, and sarcastically too, “The ides of March are here.” The Soothsayer replied, “Ay, Caesar, but not gone.” The events that followed can be found in the book of Julius Caesar.
Everything must and should be done to prevent the ‘Ideas of August” in Nigeria. It will neither be in the interest of the government nor of the people to allow the impending conflagration, as it were.
The fear of hoodlums…
Since the news broke over the planned protest by some citizens over the worsening hunger and deprivation, the concern of the government and its agencies has been that the protest could be hijacked by hoodlums, which may result in unintended consequences.
Who are these hoodlums? You may be tempted to ask. These are street urchins—the army of unemployed youths that roam the streets on a daily basis.
During elections, they come handy for all manner of electoral malfeasance. They are recruited and paid to carry out terrible activities in the interest of their temporary principals. They attack political opponents.
Those who brutally killed a women leader of a political party in Kogi State some years back were in this category. During elections, they are not hoodlums; they are political thugs. They are treated courteously and even fed sumptuously by politicians.
As long as elections are on, they are very important and useful, but when elections are over, they become hoodlums.
It means that if the Nigerian youths are gainfully employed or they have skills that put food on their table, they are not likely to foment trouble during peaceful marches that aim to show disapproval over the state of affairs in government.
Could it be safe to say that the saying “he that brought home ant-infested faggots called the visit of lizards” is apt in the scenario that is playing out?
