The Nigeria labour Congress (NLC) has demanded for immediate Wage Award and Cost of Living Allowance (COLA) to cushion the high cost of living for all workers.
The Labour made the call in a statement NLC National President, Joe Ajaero signed and released in Abuja on Sunday.
Describing the current wages as stipends of starvation, the NLC made the call amidst the rise in the prices of oil due to the ongoing war in the Middle East.
Ajaero said “the military escalation involving the US, Israel, and Iran has sent shockwaves through global oil markets. Consequently, petrol prices in Nigeria have skyrocketed to between N1,170 and N1,300 per litre.
“The Dangote Refinery has adjusted its prices in lockstep with global volatility, passing the burden directly to the masses,” Ajaero said.
In the statement titled: Save Nigerians From This Shock, An Urgent Relief Has Become Necessary, Ajaero said “this crisis has brutally exposed the fragility of Nigeria’s downstream sector, tearing off the mask of those who claimed local refining made us immune.”
The Labour lamented that the cost of petrol has made transportation was tightening the noose around the worker’s neck, adding that “food inflation is galloping, and meager wages are being swallowed by this induced scarcity.
“This is a direct assault on the Nigerian people.
“When a worker cannot afford to go to work, the economy stops. When a family cannot afford three meals a day, society sits on a keg of gunpowder.
The NLC therefore called for the revival of the Port Harcourt, Warri, and Kaduna refineries “not as a favour, but as a right of the Nigerian people to cushion themselves from a hostile global order.”
Ajaero said there has to be a timeline for the full-scale operationalization of all public refineries, adding that the billions spent on turnaround maintenance must be accounted for.
Ajaero demanded for “an expansion and overhaul of Cash Transfers to ensure transparency and that they reach the most vulnerable, with increased value to match inflation,” as well as “immediate Tax Reliefs for Workers and a stoppage of all regressive taxes on low-income earners, including the proposed tax on the informal economy. Taxing the minimum wage is extortion.”
