2024 Budget-Govt ought to make provision for New national Minimum Wage-Comrade Emelieze

The Federal Government ought to make provision for a new national minimum wage in the 2024 appropriation bill presented to both chambers of the National Assembly. This assertion was made by a former chairman of the Oyo state council of the Trade Union Congress(TUC), Comrade Andreww Emelieze. ''It is disturbing that the details of the 2024 appropriation bill were not made public, but the Federal Government ought to make provision for a new national minimum wage in the bill, if it is truly sensitive to the difficulties and hardships Nigerians are passing through. As at today, the N35,000 wage award cannot buy a bag of rice. In addition, the government has only paid the wage award once since it commenced payment to federal workers,'' Comrade Emelieze stated. Similarly, health workers in Nigeria have expressed the hopes that their new salary scale would be included in the 2024 budget. The health workers made this known through a members of the National Executive Council(NEC)of the Non-Academic Staff Union and Associated Institutions(NASU) Comrade Kehinde Abiona, who is also the chairman of the union in the University College Hospital(UCH)Ibadan, Nigeria. ''It is somehow disheartening that the reviewed CONHESS and CONMESS are yet to be implemented. The approved salary scale for health workers took effect from June 1st, 2023, but financially nothing has happened. We hope that the renewed hope agenda will not leave behind harmony in the health sector,'' Comrade Abiona concluded.