
“At the end, I am left with with something just above N20,000 after deducting union, health and others fee from the source. How do I cater for my family and meet up with societal demands?,” He asked.
The president-general, Nigeria Union of Railway Workers (NUR), Comrade Innocent Ajiji had earlier said the corporation has the worst salary structure among agencies in the FMOT.
The NUR President General said, “The pilots who man and drive all our standard gauge trains, be it Lagos-Ibadan, Abuja-Kaduna and Warri-Itakpe are all poorly remunerated. Even the ones that drive cargo trains out of our ports, they all earn below N30,000. Are we not toying with danger? When the people that we entrust to carry passengers and cargoes on our standard gauge trains are not well motivated, can something bad not happen along such voyages?
“Aside the containers or the wagons, the locomotive engine itself is worth around N600 million Naira. If we add the value of each container that a locomotive carries, 19 containers when it is 40 feet and 38 containers when it is 20 feet, then the value of one single trip out of the ports is above N1 billion Naira. Yet, we employ a pilot who earns below N30,000 to drive these trains. Is that not ridiculous? It’s only in this country that such things happen,” he said.
Also speaking, the secretary-general of the NUR, Mr. Segun Esan, reiterated that many NRC’s workers who couldn’t bear the starving wages left enmass for greener pastures elsewhere, thereby depriving the NRC the much needed man-power to improve its operations.
He said, “The salaries earned by railway workers as at today are the poorest when compared to other agencies under the FMOT or even when compared to other ministries of government. Many professionals who were employed and could have helped in improving the rail sector have left because of the starving wages given to railway workers.
