Law on minimum wage will chase away investors, says Muhakanizi
Rosebud Ltd farm manager Ravi Kumar (C) with his employees work on one of the new flower houses off Entebbe Road recently. PHOTO BY STEPHEN WANDERA
What you need to know:
Welfare. Despite efforts by a Workers’ MP to table the Minimum Wage Bill before Parliament, the Secretary to the Treasury, says investors oppose it.
Kampala. Government has said it is not interested in the proposed Minimum Wage Bill, saying it will chase away investors and development.
Workers’ MP Arinaitwe Rwakajara was granted permission by Parliament to table a private members Bill for legislation two years ago.
However, Mr Rwakajara had to get a “certificate of financial implications” from the Ministry of Finance as commitment from government that implementation of the law would be funded.
Asked why the ministry had not granted the MP a certificate, two years since he applied, Mr Keith Muhakanizi, the Secretary to the Treasury, said the law is not essential.
“Why do you think investors are running away from Kenya and coming to invest here? It is because of the Minimum Wage law that was passed there and should we do the same here? Investors do not like such a law and we are opposed to it,” Mr Muhakanizi told Daily Monitor on Sunday.
Recently, the Minister for Information and National Guidance, Maj Gen Jim Muhwezi, told journalists in Kampala that the study would guide government to review the paltry Shs6,000 minimum wage which was last set up in 1984.
Unionists have for long been pushing government to fix the minimum wage at Shs250,000 to protect workers from exploitation.
However, while Mr Rwakajara commended the move, he insists the advisory board can only be operational if there is a Minimum Wage Bill.
Parliament granted the MP leave to draft the Bill in 2013 so that he tables it for first reading but he has since been frustrated by government.
He also wrote to the Finance ministry asking for a Certificate of Financial Implication, which they have not granted him.
“The board should have a legal framework within which to operate, which is the need for a Minimum Wage Bill. What is required is a certificate of financial implications to go ahead with my Bill to have it passed,” the legislator said.
Mr Rwakajara said he would go ahead and table the legislation without a certificate of financial implications.
What law aims at
MP Rwakajara said if the Bill is passed into law, it will bring harmony between employers and employees, hence increasing productivity and development. The productivity of workers is expected to increase and rural-urban migration will be checked.
