By Abubakar Yunusa Abuja
The Civil Society organizations (CSOs)ActionAid Nigeria and Centre for Social Justice jointly recommended that the Federal Government consider a review of minimum wage to ensure it adequately meets the needs of workers, setting it at a level not less than N100,000 per month.
This is coming as the federal government recently announced the distribution of a 500 billion -naira palliative, providing 8.000to 21 million impoverished households in Nigeria for six months.
Addressing journalists during the press conference on behalf of the CSOs in Abuja yesterday,the Lead Director Center For Social Justice ,Barr Eze Onyekpere , recommended that cash transfers to the poorest of the poor on the National Social Register provided the funds are not from borrowed money but from savings.
According to them, the federal government should engage organized labor, the private sector, professionals, women, and the public in good faith disclosure and negotiations with relevant information to design social intervention programs that cushion the hardship in sectors such transport,agriculture/food, and health.
He said the transfers must be built- around increased transparency and accountability, access to information and monitoring by all interested parties including media and civil society.
“The NSR must be continually updated to take out deceased persons, previously poor but who have now left that category and include new persons who have recently fallen into the category.
Federal government should consider the introduction and local production of compressed natural gas-powered buses and vehicles for mass transit to reduce transportation costs for the poor. Such buses must be produced or assembled in Nigeria to create jobs and increase corporate income tax accruing to government.
Federal government should increase resources allocated to social health insurance, ensuring that all individuals on the National Social Register have access to health care without the burden of premiums.
“Accelerate the revitalization of existing refineries and support the production efforts of private sector refineries to avoid monopolies in the oil refining sector. Importation of refined products takes 25-30% of extant foreign exchange demands, “he said
Speaking further, he also called on the federal government to expedite the reconciliation of accruals to the Federation Account from NNPC Limited through the establishment of a high-level committee or the optimization of existing committees.
“Also guarantee security across Nigeria especially in food belts to enable Nigerians to go back to farm to produce food and increase agriculture’s contribution to GDP “
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