The Federal Government has agreed to pay federal civil servants their outstanding two-month wage award on or before August 15, 2026, following crunch talks between the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, and the leadership of the Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council, JNPSNC.
The agreement, reached at the eleventh hour, headed off a looming labour crisis after the JNPSNC had suspended an August 11 ultimatum it issued over unresolved welfare demands.
The meeting was chaired by Oyedele and attended by the Permanent Secretaries for Accounts and Special Duties in the Ministry of Finance, the minister’s Chief of Staff, directors, special advisers and other senior ministry officials.
The labour delegation was led by Comrade Kabiru Ado, National President of the Medical and Health Workers Union of Nigeria, MHWUN, and National Deputy President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, who stood in for JNPSNC’s National Chairman. Also present were the council’s National Secretary and General Secretary of the Nigeria Civil Service Union, Comrade Olowoyo Gbenga; the National Assistant Secretary and MHWUN General Secretary, Comrade Kiyawa; and other union leaders.
Beyond the wage award, both sides agreed that government would facilitate payment of the long-pending 40 per cent peculiar allowance through a supplementary budget, with the Ministry of Finance working alongside the Budget Office to secure funding.
The meeting also cleared the air on outstanding promotion arrears, with government confirming that payment processes for batches seven and nine had been resolved.
Oyedele stressed the need for sustained engagement with organised labour to maintain cordial relations with union leaders and ensure workers’ welfare concerns are resolved promptly.
Ado, representing JNPSNC National Chairman Benjamin Anto Uyanto, assured the minister of the council’s commitment to protecting workers’ interests, saying the union would ensure “workers welfare are not subjugated.”
Gbenga said the union leadership’s intervention was meant to spare the government an industrial crisis, noting that workers had been prepared to storm the minister’s office before the agreement was reached.
“The action of the national leadership of JNPSNC was to prevent national embarrassment to the federal government because workers were ready to occupy the office of the minister spontaneously,” he said.
Announcing the suspension of the August 11 ultimatum, Gbenga said the successful meeting with Oyedele had resolved the immediate standoff. He, however, warned that organised labour would keep a close watch on how the resolutions are implemented.
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