Sokoto Govt Approves Payment of N30,000 Minimum Wage

Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal of Sokoto State has approved the payment of N30,000 as minimum wage to worker in the state.

It was contained in a statement by the special adviser on media and publicity to the governor, Muhammad Bello who said the state government had reiterated the need to embark on a widescale verification exercise to weed out ghost workers, child workers and bogus employment offer syndicates.

Muhammad further added that Tambuwal had signed the report presented to him by the implementation committee on new minimum wage and consequential adjustments which was established to come up with strategies on the implementation of the new wage.

The monthly wage bill of the state will now be above N324 million as against the sum of N340 million requested for by labour union collectively in the state.

Tambuwal announced that his administration would commence implementation of the minimum wage from this month and has scheduled a meeting of the state executive council for Monday to consider the report.

According to him, the government is poised to “embark on the verification of unscheduled staff and the sharp practice of sale of offers letters of employment to unwary citizens,” stressing that “a situation where children are on the payroll of the government will not be condoned."

Prior to the negotiation that ushered the new wage regime, the state government had discovered a disparity in the salary data between the state civil service commission, the ministry of finance and the office of the head of service.

“This made me to look into the situation and we decided to harmonise all the data,” leading up to the issuance of pay slips to workers, “a first in the history of the state,” Gov. Tambuwal explained.