Oyo State Government has approved a minimum wage of ₦80,000 for the State’s workers.
Gatekeepers News reports that this announcement was made by Dotun Oyelade, the State Commissioner for Information and Orientation, in a statement released on Wednesday.
The new salary scale comes following recommendations from a Technical Committee established by the government, which obtained approval from Governor Seyi Makinde.
Implementation of this wage increase is set to occur once the committee completes the process of making consequential adjustments, which involves collaboration between government officials and labor representatives.
Oyelade noted that the National Bureau of Statistics recently published employment statistics for 2024, in which Oyo State was recognised as the most worker-friendly state in Southern Nigeria. This recognition stems from a notable decline in the state’s unemployment rate, attributed to extensive hiring across various sectors.
“The Oyo State Government has been paying workers’ salaries on the 25th of every month since Governor Makinde took office in 2019.
“The governor began paying the previous ₦30,000 minimum wage from the start of his tenure over four years ago, including consistent payments of pensions, gratuities, and a 13th-month salary for both workers and pensioners alike.
“Since November 2023, Governor Makinde has been paying ₦25,000 to workers and ₦15,000 to pensioners as a welfare wage award. The Makinde administration introduced the wage award to cushion the effects of the Federal Government’s fuel subsidy removal and has remained consistent with these payments for over a year, even to this day,” Oyelade said.
The commissioner said Makinde has paid the backlog of gratuities from 2008 to 2015 for pensioners, with an increase in gratuity payments for those under both the Local Government Staff Pensions Board and those paid by the Ministry of Establishment and Training.
He added that the governor has also reinstated pensioners whose names were removed by the previous administration and continues to provide all pensioners with an annual Christmas/New Year chicken bonus.
