The Dilemma Of Rising Costs Vs Minimum Wage

The non-stop hike in the prices of goods and services, is making life more difficult for public sector workers, says the president, National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT), Mr. Ibeji Nwokoma, even as he called on the federal government to increase the minimum wage.

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) July report revealed that the prices of food items like white beans, tomatoes, beef, groundnut oil and local rice etc increased in July, 2022. For instance, the average price of 1kg of white beans rose by 23.22 per cent from N444.21 in July 2021 to N547.38 in July 2022. “On a month-on-month basis, the price increased by 2.09 per cent from N536.17 in June 2022 to N547.38 in July 2022,’’ it added.

The report also stated that average price of a bottle of groundnut oil stood at N1,078.17 in July 2022, showing an increase of 40.24 per cent from N768.81 in July 2021.

On services like transportation, the price of air tickets which was agreed by stakeholders in the sector in the first quarter of the year at N50,000 has continued to rise on a daily basis. For instance, between the first and second quarter of 2022, the price of airfares has risen by 38 percent to N80,000 for one way journey.

Civil servants in Nigeria can no longer cope with the continuous increase in the prices of goods and services, considering the fact that the minimum wage is nothing to write home about, Nwokoma tells me.

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As efforts by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) to draw the attention of the federal government to the plights of Nigerians, Nwokoma revealed that the congress has written to the federal government to increase the minimum wage, because the wage is no longer feasible.

NLC has also written to government to stop leakages which is the major issue that has marred the economy.

“There are so many leakages in government. For instance, there is no bulletproof way of ensuring that whatever that was collected by government agencies at the collection point, are remitted to the government. Also, there is no exact amount of fuel subsidy that is being paid, because we do not know the exact amount of fuel that is being consumed by Nigerians on a daily basis, hence the reason why there is a lot of fraud going on in that sector. Government may be paying for fuel that Nigerians are not even consuming. If government can close these gaps, there is hope that the economy will bounce back,” he explained.

NLC is also doing leadership retreat for all affiliates, like NAAT to sensitise them on their roles, NAAT president stated, adding that, “When we talk about government, we are the government, so we need to educate Nigerians on their role in revamping the economy. We need to raise the consciousness of Nigerians on the need for them to be more productive, so as to grow the economy.”