Nigeria’s unions temporarily suspend strike during negotiations

Nigeria’s main unions, the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC), have suspended their indefinite strike for a week to continue negotiations with the government over a new minimum wage. The strike, which began on Monday and continued until Tuesday, had brought down the national power grid and disrupted flights to protest the government’s inability to agree on a new wage amid rising inflation and a worsening cost of living crisis. After talks late into the night on Monday, the government appeared open to a higher minimum wage than the $41.38 (60,000 naira) initially proposed, but no new amount was announced. TUC president Festus Osifo said the unions had given the government a week’s deadline to propose an acceptable minimum wage. The strike followed President Bola Tinubu’s decision to eliminate a petrol subsidy that had kept petrol prices low in a bid to reduce government spending.

SOURCE: VOA NEWS