Reps Move To Compel Foreign Companies To Pay Minimum Wage

The House of Representatives yesterday passed through second reading a  bill seeking to compel companies with foreign interests in the country to  pay National Minimum Wage.

The bill is titled: “An act to amend the National Minimum Wage Act 2004″,  seeks to exclude the establishments that have foreign participation from  the list of establishments exempted from the payment of National Minimum  Wage and for other related matters,”.

The bill sponsored by Hon. Peter Akpatason (APC-Edo), also seeks to put  companies which employ minimum of 20 workers on the list of establishments  that will be paying national minimum wage as stipulated in subsection 1a of the piece of legislation.

According to him, companies that make profits worth billions of naira in  Nigeria do not have up to 50 workers,  but do not pay the N18,000 national minimum wage.

Akpatason noted that to have excluded foreign owned companies from the payment of minimum wage was no only a great disservice to the nation, but has robbed the country huge revenue.

He said there is need to delete subsection 1e which provides that “person  working in ships and airplanes were excluded in the principal Act, to effectively address the lacuna,

Similarly, he noted there is also the need to delete section 4 of the  principal Act which granted “permit for exemption for worker affected by  infirmity or physical injury as it is discriminatory against the disabled.

Akpatason argued for the amendment of Section 6(3) of the principal Act, that grants the Attorney-General of the Federation discretionary powers to determine who or not to prosecute for contraventions of the minimum wage law.

He said the interpretation of the foreign companies in the last amendment to the existing Act, included those that have up to 50% equity participation by foreigners.

He further said: “in addition to broadening the scope of participation to incorporate more categories of Nigerian workers eligible to benefit from minimum wage payment, these proposed amendments also represent a clear demonstration of this 8th Assembly to timeously address issue of obsolete laws in support of the change agenda of this government.”

The bill was referred to the House Committee on Labour, Employment and Productivity for further legislative inputs after it was passed by the House.