Manufacturing companies in Nigeria says that unless the federal government address the challenges confronting their businesses, they won’t be able to pay the new minimum wage of N70,000 agreed with Labour.
Segun Ajayi-Kadir, the Director-General of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) disclosed this, following the recent Presidential announcement on the new minimum wage.
Ajayi-Kadir said that there was the need to ameliorate those challenges in order to improve the capacity of the members to pay the minimum wage that was offered.
He said: ” We maintained that those binding constraints may constitute impediments to the full compliance of our member when the minimum wage is signed into law.
To this end, we presented a list of demands including the following:
1) SMEs and MSMEs should be exempted from compliance in view of their incapacity and prevailing operational challenges.
2) CBN redemptions of all validly transacted outstanding forex forwards for companies in the productive sector.
3) The reversal of increase in electricity tariffs OR only 100% increase in electricity tariff for minimum of 20 hours of supply.
We maintained that those binding constraints may constitute impediments to the full compliance of our member when the minimum wage is signed into law
4) Duty exemption on imported conversion kits and government subsidy on procurement of same.
5) A freeze on introduction of new taxes on businesses for the next five years
6) Fixed rate of N800 for the assessment of import duty on all production inputs.
7) Revisit of the recent Financial Reporting Council regulation to curtail its application to private businesses.
8) Discontinuation of the Price Verification Portal as it is inimical to the smooth operation of businesses and the basis for setting it up no longer exist. This has been implemented by the CBN.
“We are optimistic that the positive atmosphere created by the recent agreement between government and Labour would facilitate speedy consideration and acceptance of aforementioned.”