By Justina Asishana, Minna
Niger workers may embark on strike after a meeting with the State Government, which has insisted on salary slash.
The Nation gathered the action will take effect if government sticks to its decision to slash salaries over dwindling federal allocation.
It also learnt the government is planning to pay workers 70 percent November salary across board, a decision Organised Labour vowed not to.take.
The Organised Labour and all affiliated Unions during the State Executive Council (SEC) meeting in Minna unanimously agreed anything less than 100 per cent workers salary will not be accepted.
They gave the state government end of November to conform to paying workers their full salaries, stressing refusal will lead to indefinite strike action.
Chairman Niger Trade Union Congress (TUC), Comrade Inusa Tanimu, who spoke with The Nation explained the Organised Labour would take a stand regarding the industrial action after meeting with government.
He declared that any salary below 100 per cent would not be accepted by the unions
“We are meeting tomorrow(Thursday) we are still talking with them but one thing we have decided is that anything less than 100 per cent is a no to us,” he stated.
But the government has maintained it has no choice but to slash the salaries of workers.
The Secretary to the Niger State Government, Alhaji Ahmed Ibrahim Matane, who spoke to The Nation explained it was not so much about the slash but inability of the government to pay 100 per cent salary to workers.
He said because of recession, the Federal allocation has dropped to a level where the state government can no longer pay 100 per cent salaries.
“There is no talk about slash in the salaries of civil servants. What we have discussed with the Organised Labour was that because of the recession, our FAAC allocation has dropped to a level where we won’t be able to pay 100 per cent of the salary.
“We called their attention to this, we opened our books in terms of how much we received, the existing commitments and what is left over,” he stressed.
Matane further confirmed that there will be a meeting with Labour to take certain positions, “we will meet again on Thursday to take certain positions. That is where we are now.”
