The Gani Fawehinmi Memorial Organisation (Gafamorg) has called on the Nigerian government to review and fix the terrible conditions of the Nigerian workers by increasing its minimum wage from the current meagre N30,000 to N100,000.
The organisation added that this is to match the rate of inflation and make life much better and meaningful for the working sector.
Politics Nigeria gathered that Gafamorg made the demand in a goodwill message to Nigerian workers during the International Workers Day celebration on Monday, May 1, while felicitating with workers for the immense contributions of their labour and service towards the economic engineering, growth and progress of Nigeria.
In the statement jointly signed by the National Chairman and Public Relations Officer of the organisation, Comrade Agunbiade Babatunde and Comrade Akintunde Adedeji, respectively, Gafamorg also called for a downward review of fuel pump prices to alleviate the sufferings of the workers and masses, who bear the economic brunt of astronomical increase every now and then.
The statement partly read, “Nigerian workers had enough of the ruinous ruling class untoward sufferings and hardships, foisted and unleashed on them, through institutional failures and corruption which is endemic via policies formulated by the political class the ruling government as a whole; systemic as it were.
“We equivocally condemned in its entirety and holistically government indifference and nonchalant disposition towards workers condition.
“Since last year 2022, Nigerian workers/masses were subjected to artificial fuel scarcity by Petroleum marketers in cahoot with cabals in government, who jacked/hiked petrol prices as high as N500 to N600 per litre, with the attendant woes and losses that came with it, while a litre of petrol is currently sold at N220 in some parts of the country and slightly higher than that in other regions, even as fuel scarcity and long queues are gradually reducing and subsiding in most cities of the country; a situation Nigerian workers contend with in spite of their meager income.
“As the 6th largest oil producing country in the world under OPEC, Nigeria is the only country that export crude oil and import refined petroleum products, due to the dysfunctional and comatose state of our four refineries; a deliberate one as that, while the much touted oil subsidy which has become a swan song within the ruling class and the entire polity is a big scam and corruption of the highest order, calculated method of milking the country dry by cabals in power, to enrich themselves at the expense of majority of Nigerians pauperized, which constitute the workers who labour and toil for it.”
Gafamorg, however, called on the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) to come together and forge a common front with their allies in the Civil Society Organisations to fight and defeat the anti-poor/masses policies, neo-liberal programs of the Capitalist and Imperialist government of the day and the incoming one to make life more meaningful to the working masses and generality of Nigerians.
The organisation demanded, “the immediate review of the minimum wage from the paltry sum of N30,000 and increase to a better living minimum wage of N100,000 with matching increases to the rates of inflation.
“The overhauling of our existing comatose refineries and building of additional ones, to enable us refine our crude oil locally for local consumption, export the surplus, obliterate fuel scarcity which automatically would halt vide put a stop to importation of petroleum products and the claim by the corrupt cabals of subsidizing oil imported, which is corruption subsidy not oil subsidy, a fraud/scam.
“A call for a probe of the payment of oil subsidy to corrupt beneficiaries under the past governments and the present one.
“Nigeria as a rich oil country can afford to own more refineries, with the compliment of modular refineries under the direct management of workers and other stakeholders, to boost oil production, thus this is more important and should be addressed as urgent as possible by the government, because oil is the only economy mainstay of Nigeria, as a mono economy nation.
“Downward review of the current pump price of fuel by the government, to alleviate the sufferings of the workers and masses, who bear the economic brunt of astronomical increase every now and then.”
“No to removal of fuel subsidy but an end to corruption. Subsidy is a cesspool of corruption in Nigeria.”
