Gilbert Bawara (Minister of the Civil Service, Labor and Social Dialogue) and the social partners continue their journey. They discussed this Tuesday in Atakpamé (about 175 km north of Lomé) with economic actors from the Central and Plateaux regions on the revaluation of the guaranteed interprofessional minimum wage (SMIG) and the minimum agricultural wage (SMAG).
This meeting is part of a national tour of information and exchanges undertaken by the Ministry of the Public Service, Labor and Social Dialogue in collaboration with the social partners, in particular the trade unions and the employers.
It comes after the Kara stage, where the minister and his delegation did the same exercise with the economic operators of the Savanes and Kara regions.
The objective is to inform and further edify employers on the new measures taken by the government to offer and guarantee employees in the private sector good working and living conditions. The aim is to make the SMIG and the SMAG comprehensible in order to facilitate the implementation of this measure at all levels of activity.
In Atakpamé, the exchanges and debates affected all sectors of activity, including private structures and establishments of denominational education, processing industries, guarding and security companies for economic operators, agricultural enterprises and others.
The interactive discussions mainly focused on the constraints related to the application of this new measure, the management of claims in companies and the deadline for application.
Subjects relating to the declaration of personnel to the national social security fund (CNSS) and health insurance were also discussed.
Clear up misunderstandings and misinterpretations
Minister Gilbert Bawara made it clear that through this meeting, it is a question of better explaining the content and meaning of this new measure in order to dispel misunderstandings and misinterpretations.
For him, the government intends through this revaluation to support the purchasing power of workers in the private sector to cope with the high cost of living linked to the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian crisis.
The SMIG, he continued, agrees and applies to the labor code and constitutes a mandatory provision that employers must scrupulously respect.
“Upgrading should not lead to staff cuts or lead to a decrease in business activities,” he stressed.
Dialogue and consultation must prevail in companies and to have productive workers they must be well remunerated, insisted Mr. Bawara. He urged employers to exercise common sense and responsibility.
The President of the National Council of Employers, Laurent Tamégnon, for his part, explained and retraced the steps taken for the adoption of this measure for the benefit of workers in the private sector and indicated that through this tour, it is a question of collecting and to have an overview of the concerns and difficulties of employers in the face of this measure in terms of application, in order to find an appropriate solution for the application of the amount set by the government and the stakeholders.
Recall that according to an order of the Minister published on Monday and dated December 31, 2022, “the SMIG and the SMAG are set at 302.89 F.CFA/hour or 52,500 F.CFA per month throughout the national territory and for all branches of economic activity from January 1, 2023”.
This decision follows the proposal made on December 31 to the government by the leaders of the seven trade union federations, the National Council of Employers (CNP), the Association of Large Enterprises of Togo (AGET) and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry Togo (CCIT).
In Togo, the SMIG has been set at CFAF 35,000 since 2011. The latter “agreed”, after the meetings and consultations held on December 24 and 30, 2022, to “propose to the government to raise the SMIG, in order to raise it from 35,000 F.CFA currently to 52,500 F.CFA as of January 1, 2023”. FIN
From Atakpame, Yorou Issifou
