Government officials and capitalist employers have always argued that trade unions cause inflation by demanding higher wages. But empirical evidence in Nigeria and several other countries shows that the opposite is actually the case. Inflation is a whip which the capitalists use to reduce workers’ real wages, even when there is a nominal increase in our wages, thus resulting in the reduction of the share of national income that ends up in the pockets of already impoverished workers.
Inflation has gotten so entrenched in socio-economic debate nowadays. We often hear in the mass media talks about the GDP, Real GDP, inflation, consumer price index (CPI) etc. It has thus become a topic that is not limited to discussion by economists. It resonates with the different classes and strata of the society, with its multifaceted effects on the livelihood of the working class, women and youth. Realising this, apologists of the Tinubu regime and big business have been doing all they can to give the working class dog a bad name to hang it. Their voices were loud in calling out the trade unions to be “reasonable” during the national minimum wage negotiations, leading to an agreement for a minimum wage that is definitely not a living wage. These ideological mouthpieces include the likes of Adams Oshiomole, mainstream media houses, liberal economic experts, and obviously paid political pundits like Reno Omokri.
The trade unions succumbed to the cries and lies of our exploiters, oppressors and their publicists, to accept a N70,000 minimum wage which cannot buy a single bag of rice, while N30,000 could buy two to three bags of rice when it was made the minimum wage in 2019. On the eve of signing the 70,000 minimum wage, the NLC president, Joe Ajaero is reported to have said that the Tinubu regime had threatened to increase the pump price of petrol, once again, if the unions demand for a N250,000 minimum wage was to be considered. And according to him, this would have led to higher inflation and consequently higher cost of commodities in the market, which would lead to high unemployment, because government spending would reduce and consumption will also drop. The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) leadership who represent the mass of working-class people must fiercely refute this superficial argument.
To borrow from the words of the founding president of the current NLC, Comrade Hassan Summonu, 28 years ago, “the first challenge (for the trade unions) is that of relevance. How can we make the Nigerian Trade Union Movement to be relevant? To be relevant, the Nigerian trade union movement has to be proactive and not reactive, as the case is at present”. For us as working-class activists, we must consistently point out that inflation is a reflection of the systemic problem of capitalist development because it is geared towards putting profit before people. This is what the mainstream media, capitalist politicians and their lackeys will mischievously shy away from mentioning.
The real wages of Nigerian workers has consistently declined since the the Nigerian state’s adoption of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) in 1986. The SAP prescription on developing countries like Nigeria, which was from the international financial institutions like the IMF and World Bank, was driven by free market ideology of trade liberalisation, currency devaluation, etc. While the names have changed over the decades into National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) under Olusegun Obasanjo, Transformative Agenda under Goodluck Jonathan, Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) of Muhammadu Buhari and now Renewed Hope of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the same neoliberal logic of capitalism which was put in place four decades ago is still what the Nigerian state is utilising for maldevelopment that keeps making live worse for the working class.
The so-called invisible hand of market forces that is central to SAP, under any name so called, will only keep driving the economy into perpetual inflationary spiral. Inflation is endemic to capitalist economic systems. It is a phenomenon that reflects the inherent dynamics of capitalism and its crises. To address the deepening socioeconomic servitude of the working people of Nigeria, we must not allow ourselves to be gaslighted into accepting suffering wages.
by Kelvin AYEMHENRE
