Barring any last‑minute changes, the Federal Government will begin paying the planned increase in civil servants’ salaries by the end of April. President Major General Muhammadu Buhari, retired, is expected to give his final assent for the disbursement at any moment. If the proposal is approved, the increase will arrive about two months before the June deadline for removing the petrol subsidy.
Officials told The exclusively that the new pay rise, termed a “consequential allowance,” would boost government workers’ current pay by 40 percent. Olajide Oshundun, Director of Press and Public Relations at the Ministry of Labour and Employment, said the 40 percent increase could start being paid at the end of April, with arrears for January, February and March to be settled later. She could not confirm whether the President had signed the committee’s proposal. “Consequential allowance salaries will be increased by 40 percent for civil servants from level 1 to level 17,” she explained. “What we receive now is called the consolidated public service salary structure, which combines basic pay and all allowances. The increase will be 40 percent of what a public servant is earning now. Payments will start at the end of this month, and the arrears for January, February and March will be paid later. The salary increase is effective from January 2023. That is the proposal submitted by the committee set up to look into salary adjustment for civil servants, but I am not sure if the President has signed it yet.”
Last month, Labour and Employment Minister Chris Ngige announced that the Federal Government had approved a pay raise for civil servants, which had been included in the 2023 budget and would take effect from 1 January 2023. Ngige described the raise as a “peculiar allowance” intended to cushion workers against rising inflation, higher living costs, transport fares, housing and electricity tariffs.
Nigeria’s headline inflation rose to 22.04 percent year‑on‑year in March, the highest rate since September 2005. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, this marks the third consecutive monthly increase, up 0.13 percentage points from February. Food and beverages were the biggest contributors, followed by housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuel, clothing and footwear, transport, furnishings, education, health, miscellaneous goods and services, restaurants and hotels, alcoholic beverages, tobacco and kola, recreation and culture, and communication.
Organised‑labour leaders, however, described the proposed rise as a meagre allowance that does not equate to a 40 percent salary increase. In a telephone interview, Trade Union Congress National Vice President Tommy Etim said the government’s move was to increase “allowances and not salaries,” labeling it a “peculiar allowance” linked to the fuel‑subsidy removal and inflation. He stressed that no civil servant had yet received the payment and warned against misinforming the public. Etim, also president of the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria, urged the government to consider raising other allowances, especially housing and transport, noting that many civil servants spend most of their salary on these costs.
The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) denied any knowledge of the proposed increment, calling it a rumor. NLC National Treasurer Hakeem Ambali said the union had not been involved in any discussions and that any changes to fringe benefits must go through collective bargaining in a tripartite setting. “We are only hearing it as rumours because there are procedures for negotiating fringe benefits and workers’ entitlement through collective bargaining,” he said. “Any increment not based on empirical data would not be agreeable to labour. We must sit down to examine inflationary and economic trends and reach a logical conclusion. The first step is to return to the negotiating table.” When asked about the union’s next action if the government proceeds with the plan, Ambali replied that labour would continue its push, emphasizing that any allowance that does not reflect current economic realities would not be acceptable.
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