The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, has disclosed that his monthly salary after taxation is N942,000.
Ngige disclosed this on Monday, May 1, 2023, while featuring on Channels Television Politics Today programme.
When asked if the salary includes allowances, Ngige said he, like other ministers, is not entitled to any other allowances.
When pressed further to clarify the claims, the Minister said: “My feeding, my transport, the salary of one Personal Assistant (PA), the salary of my gardener, my books, they are all consolidated. And after heavy taxation, they pay me N942,000. Every minister you see that is what it is. We don’t have any allowances except when we travel.”
Earlier, Ngige said Nigerian workers are right to ask for more pay but that the federal government is trying its best.
The Labour Minister, however, ruled out reports that there will be a rise in the minimum wage before the end of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
Ngige explained that such is reviewed in five years, which he said is expected to happen in 2024 under the incoming administration, as the last was done in 2019.
Meanwhile, in another event earlier, the Minister of Labour and Employment slammed the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) for planning to embark on strike if their demands are not met within the next two weeks.
OsunDaily News reported that the resident doctors had on Saturday given the federal government two weeks to meet its demands or face industrial disharmony.
The resident doctors made this known in a communiqué issued on Saturday at the end of its Extraordinary National Executive Council (NEC) meeting held in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
The doctors listed some of their demands to include the welfare of the doctors, the alarming rate of their flight to other countries, poor remuneration, inadequate funding of the health sector, and the attendant negative effect on the citizens and the health workers.
Other demands are the immediate increment in the Consolidated Medical Salary Structure (CONMESS) to the tune of 200 per cent of the current gross salaries of doctors in addition to the new allowances on the review of the CONMESS.
The NARD also demanded the immediate withdrawal and jettisoning of the bill seeking to compel medical and dental graduates to render five-year compulsory services in Nigeria before being granted full licenses to practice.
Speaking in an interview on Arise Television on Monday, Ngige said the doctors cannot embark on strike over a bill seeking to compel them to stay in the country for five years before being granted full licenses to practice.
The minister stated that the doctors with their demands demonstrate an “entitlement syndrome” while adding that the government has given resident doctors “everything they want”.
He added that the bill seeking to limit the migration of health workers is a “private member bill” and is beyond the authority of the executive.
