The Nigerian Senate has promised to pass the new minimum wage bill as fast as possible once it is transmitted by President Bola Tinubu.
The assurance was given by the chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Senator Yemi Adaramodu, during a chat with newsmen in Abuja.
According to him, the lawmakers can pass the bill within thirty minutes as long as it does not have any internal or external opposition.
The Senate spokesperson, however, added that despite the promise to give the new minimum wage bill an accelerated hearing, the lawmakers would ensure the bill passes through all the necessary legislative processes.
Asked if the Senate will pass the minimum wage bill just like it passed the New National Anthem Bill within a few days, Adaramodu said: “Yes, if immediately after Sallah, the Bill is brought by Mr. President to the National Assembly, it’s going to be dealt with, with speed of lightning.
“We are going to pass it because it is for the benefit of Nigerian workers. Even if it is possible within 30 minutes, we will do that.
“But it depends on the content of the Bill because the bill will go through the crucibles of the passage of a Bill.
“We are not going to sit down and just say that the Bill has been passed. We will go through the crucibles. So within the time, if there are no oppositions from outside, if there are no oppositions from within, there can never be opposition from within because it’s going to be a kind of agreement between Labour, government and organised private sector.
“So once that one is there and then it comes to us, so definitely we will go through the processes without delay and make sure that Nigerian workers get their deal.”
On whether the Senate is envisaging opposition from the state governments who have already made it known that they may not be able to afford the N62,000 being proposed by the federal government, Adaramodu said it is expected that such issues would have been harmonized before the bill is forwarded to the Senate.
“Since they are all meeting, we know that at the end of the day, all of them will agree on the figure because when it’s an executive bill, an executive bill means state executive, federal executive and even local government executive.
“So definitely, there is going to be an agreement. So once there’s an agreement, the bill will come and I don’t think any of the components of the negotiating bodies will oppose the agreed figure at the end of the day.
“So we don’t have any fear about that. You know when you are negotiating, you negotiate from various parameters and parallels. So at the end of the day, all the lines will converge and meet at a concentric point.
So that’s where we now come in. We come in at the end of the tunnel and then we’ll pick it from there and make it into law so that we can have a better deal for Nigerian workers,” the lawmaker submitted.
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