The Association of Nigeria Aviation Professionals (ANAP), National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), and other unions under the aviation sector may call off strike action embarked upon by NiMet staff over poor welfare for two days.
After meeting with the Unions in Abuja on Thursday, the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo said in the last few hours, “We looked at the issues, and we discovered that there was not much disagreement, some of the issues were implementation, and maybe miscommunication between us and our brother comrades here.
“I must say that since we came to this ministry, including the Heads of Agencies and, of course, my permanent secretary, we have enjoyed very cordial relations with all the aviation unions.
“We are on the same page on most of their demands. We identify with their demands, and we identify with their struggles on most of these issues. And it was only natural today that we resolve these issues” he stated.
The Minister explained some of the issues that have been agreed on, “there is the issue of salary relativity with other agencies. We have since agreed on this. In our last stakeholders meeting in Lagos. I agreed that the salaries of NIMET in particular, the Nigerian Meteorological Services, was atrocious, and not at par with other aviation agencies, and it was only natural that their patience would run very thin’.
Keyamo applauded the staff of the Agency for their patience. “I just want to commend all the workers of NIMET, we commend them for their patience, for their resilience, and to say that we identify actually with their agitation on this issue.
“So, we resolved that immediately, I will write a letter to Mr. President. This matter had been approved before, just to put it in context. It was approved at that time that there should be salary relativity amongst the key aviation agencies, especially NIMET and NAMA in particular.
“We also looked at the issue of the minimum wage, and we have since agreed on the implementation of the minimum wage regarding NIMET. We have forwarded all documents and approvals to the Budget Office of the Federation. And the Budget Office of the Federation is at the cusp of forwarding the documents for implementation.
“Now, what we have agreed is to monitor this process, not only with management but in conjunction with the union members. Just to show transparency and honesty on our part, we insisted that the union members should be part of this process of monitoring it at the Budget Office”.
He explained that the minimum wage, “based on even our budget head now since it is a statutory matter, it has been approved, there is no point to start looking for cash, whatever money we have now, we will pay the minimum wage immediately.
“This is a message to all my NiMet workers, when you see your next alert, it will reflect the minimum wage. Whatever shortfall we now experience before the end of the budget cycle, we shall proceed to ask for a supplementary budget to cover it up.
“That is what we agreed upon. There is also the issue of handling the 2019 consequential adjustments that were made following the minimum wage increase at that time. And just to put it in context, this one I just talked about the immediate implementation is the 2024 minimum wage.
“The other one that was still hanging was the 2019 minimum wage adjustment and the consequential adjustments that were made. When the consequential adjustments were made, it took a long time for us to pay them, when that time came, we paid them and there was a shortfall of nine months.
“Also, there were staff, about 30 of them that were captured but they were not paid. So on both issues we agreed, there is even no dispute about that, it will be implemented immediately”.
Speaking further, the Minister noted that ”there were two issues we took the same position on. There was the issue of the 25 to 30% wage award by the federal government. If you remember this time of agitation for minimum wage adjustment, the President graciously intervened and said there should be a 25 to 30% wage award. That was not implemented for nine months and there was a bit of confusion as to the status of that award by the federal government.
‘If there was such an award and it was implemented regarding other agencies, we in the aviation industry will not allow our own agencies to be shortchanged on this. So we agreed that on this issue there would be a small committee chaired by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry.
“There is another issue of 40% peculiar allowance. Apart from this 25 and 30% wage award, there is also another issue of the 40% peculiar allowance by the federal government.
“So on these two issues, because there is a bit of cloudiness on them, we agreed that a small committee chaired by the Permanent Secretary is to engage the Income, Salaries and Wages Commission to get some clarity, the unions will be involved.
‘The sixth issue, the subsistence allowance, we have since approved and directed for immediate payment, not payment in two weeks. I have directed for immediate payment as of tomorrow. If there is anything more immediate than tomorrow, they should be paid immediately.
“There was an issue of annual training for the workers. In fact, we also agreed that by next year, It should be reviewed upwards and that payment should be made in May of every year” he reaffirmed.
Keyamo stated “If you know our background here, Myself and the Permanent Secretary, we come from civil society and the labor relations too. So we have a lot to prove here to the union members.
‘We have a lot of integrity behind our trajectory getting here and dealing with the labor union. We said we’ll be back here on the 12th of May, this meeting is adjourned for us to clearly track the implementation of these decisions,” the Minister said.
On their part, the President of ANAP, Comrade Alade Adedayo, and the General Secretary of NUATE, Ocheme Aba said they would go back and inform their members of the progress of the meeting with the Minister.
Both of the Union leaders did not say they had called off the strike, but indications suggest that they would end the protest tonight and resume work.
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