The Nigerian Senate has approved N30, 000 as minimum wage for workers in Nigeria, following in the footsteps of the House of Representatives.
The national minimum wage bill will become effective after President Muhammadu Buhari assents to it.
The chairman of the ad-hoc committee set up to review the bill, Francis Alimikhena, presented a report on Tuesday.
The report recommended that N30, 000 be approved as minimum wage for Nigerian workers.
It also recommended that the federal government put in place a procedure to review revenue sharing formula to enhance state capabilities towards implementation of the new wage.
The committee also suggested that relevant agencies should compute the cost implication of the bill on the 2019 budget and forward same to the National Assembly.
N75, 000 was recommended as fine ‘for not keeping records of employees.
The lawmakers adopted all the recommendations.
The Senate Leader, Ahmed Lawan, commended the federal government for its effort on the bill.
The Minority Leader, Biodun Olujimi, urged the federal government to pay more attention to the revenue sharing formula to lawfully enforce compliance by state governments.
Senate President Bukola Saraki added: “I want to commend the leaders of the organisations of the union. Let me also state that as government, we should ensure that at times like these, we should not wait for there to be strikes to do what is truly deserving for our workers.”
The bill passed the first and second reading at the Senate on January 24.
It was referred to an ad-hoc committee headed by Olusola Adeyeye.
However, the committee’s chairman had to be changed last week due to his unavailability on health grounds.
The House of Representatives had on January 29 approved N30, 000 as minimum wage for workers in the public and private sectors.