‘We can’t afford N18,000 minimum wage,’ Governors say

Nigeria’s 36 governors have said that they can no longer afford to pay the N18,000 minimum wage to their workers due to the economic crisis in the country.

The governors, under the umbrella of the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF), made the submission during a meeting at the Presidential Villa which ended early on Thursday, November 19, 2015.

“We resolved that we must look at ways to enhance revenue generation and at the same time look at ways to cut our overhead costs more especially the political office holders’ salaries and other overhead expenses,” NGF Chairman and Zamfara State Governor, Abdulaziz Yari said.

“The situation is no longer the same when we were asked to pay N18,000 minimum wage, when oil price was $126 (per barrel) and continued paying N18,000 minimum wage when the oil is $41 and the source of government expenditure is from oil, and we have not seen prospects in the oil industry in the near future.

“We will diversify our economy in the area of agriculture and mining. But at the same time, we should understand our situation where some of us (states) today are taking N100million take home (monthly allocation) and then have salaries in particular of over N2billion to pay.

“We therefore agreed here to take this suggestion to NEC in our meeting tomorrow (Thursday) so that we can be able to find ways to tackle this problem.

“And we are looking at coming together to discussing with Mr. President and his team, with governors, technocrats and experts in the economy to see how we can tackle our troubled situation. We are working harder to deal with it,” he added.

The governors also urged President Muhammadu Buhari to take urgent steps to solve the economic crisis in the country.

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