Minimum wage, George Akume and his four unfortunate drivers
By Dominic Kidzu
“When the people shall have nothing more to eat, they will eat the rich”: Jean – Jacques Rousseau.
President Tinubu‘s Federal Government has never taken the organised Labour seriously. They see them at best as minions on the chess board, who are easily intimidatable, if compromisable or indeed slight men, long on threats and short on consequences. But now the cookie is crumbling, making a mockery of the arrogance of power. An example that once the people decide to move together against their oppressors, the stuffed turtles will leave the burning city in a hurry. With their hairy tails stuffed between their twiggy legs, of course.
Joe Ajaero, the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress has been beaten blue and black by police in Owerri and his house in Lagos burnt down by a mystery fire just to demonstrate on which side the balance of power tilts. But Comrade Joe continues to soldier on, in spite of, in the Olympian pursuit of a living wage for workers. Even though we always knew that a living wage was never going to be possible without a complete blood refill and psychic review of our four-by-forever leaders taking turns on the political circuit to conduct the manner of sharing the booty.
It was a sensible thing that labour heeded the plea of the president, because that will help both sides to smoke the peace pipe and still continue to look almost respectable. We run a constitutional monarchy and only an unhinged bloke can say no to an angry president. Already there are rumours that the federal government has accepted to pay N62,000 minimum wage, a good place for workers to be, if you as me. Any pay rise that is up to 100 percent is a decent movement forward even if it is not up to what they wanted and still not capable of buying a 50kg bag of rice.
READ ALSO: Only men in Nigeria with one wife are the broke, sick and very old ones
The real killjoy was the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, who’s demoralizing comments about not being able to pay his FOUR drivers N60,000 (40 USD) monthly salaries revealed how disrespectful he was to less privileged folks. He has by this silly commentary inadvertently showed off himself as a mean slave driver who is arrogant about his elevated position in life and condescending to people of a lower station. Now Nigerians are wondering why Mr Akume needs FOUR drivers for himself alone, how they survive on less than N60,000 and why he decided to make a joke about their lowly state publicly. You can now see why some small people sometimes chop off the heads of their mean-hearted employers, don’t you.
As if this faux pas was not enough, the man’s further comments accusing Organised Labour of ‘treasonable felony and economic sabotage’ reveals the kind of mindset that permeates the ruling class
From his diatribe, one can see how truly angry Akume is that labour actually found the pluck and circumstance to ask for a wage increase. These fat cats really take the rest of us for a song and dance! They cannot believe that workers also have a right to seek to be happy or comfortable. They find the very idea of such aspirations by workers outrageous, even offensive. Forget the platitudes on the public gallery, these guys truly don’t believe that we are anywhere near equal to them. Even when Gustave Flaubert opines that “one needs a feeling heart to understand others”.They want none of that. And you know what, the only reason they are able to do this and get away with it is because we let them do it!
For somebody who holds a Masters degree in Industrial and Labour Relations and who was for a long time a civil servant in Benue state, Akume has thoroughly undone himself with his recent disgraceful public statements. That is what happens when one man serves as governor, senator, minister and now SGF. He begins to think himself the Collosus of Rhodes, and all of us as petty men walking under his huge legs, peeping about until we find ourselves dishonourable graves. Akume has taken his condescending behavior from Benue all the way to Abuja, without grace or decency. How does one blame him for his puffy speeches when indeed he was a key minister in Buhari’s woeful administration that brought us to this sorry pass, yet he has been elevated even higher by his long time friend, Tinubu. Any wonder that he believes he owns the earth and everything in it?
READ ALSO: National anthem as a comic interlude, By Dominic Kidzu
In the end the leaders and members of the organised labour will be the fitting heroes of the struggle, in both the way they have endured hunger and suffering and fought against deprivation in their own country. The world outside is listening and seeing the shameful distortions in the Nigerian socio-economic system where a senator receives about 20,000USD a month and other citizens receive 20USD because government at all levels cannot pay them 40USD a month. The joke is not on labour. The joke is on the government and the marauding bandits who pass themselves off as leaders because the world outside is watching and listening. Seychelles pays it’s workers a minimum wage of 465USD, followed by Libya, Morroco, South Africa, even Cameroun pays above a hundred USD minimum wage per month but Nigeria says it cannot pay 40USD. And the state governors are proud to announce that they cannot pay 40USD. ‘Will not’ is better because ‘cannot’ is false. Luckily, the people are witnesses to the lifestyle of these same governors. Everyone is watching everyone, the clock is ticking too, and the day of reckoning cannot now be too far away.
