By Mustapha Sesay
Following the enactment of a new minimum wage Act last year, which takes effect this month, thousands of Sierra Leoneans are bound to lose their jobs, employers have said.
A number of employers, among them security companies and domestic service providers who spoke to Politico, said they could not afford the new Le 500,000 minimum wage, but would have to lay off some of their staff.
The administrative secretary at Trust Security Services, Austin Williams, said some of them had already received letters from some of their clients terminating contracts because the new minimum wage.
Though the new salary scale was a welcome idea as it would help improve the living standard of many qualified Sierra Leoneans, Williams noted that it would also have a dire effect on their businesses because many of their clients would not afford to pay for their services anymore.
“In an effort to better the lives of employees, many others would end up losing their jobs and this will definitely increase the crime rate in the country,” he pointed out.
Another employer who could no longer afford to pay his house maid laid her off as the new wage takes effect this month. James Kanu stated that as much as he was aware of the importance of house maids, he could not afford to keep one anymore.
Meanwhile, Sierra Leone’s Labor Congress, SLCC, has expressed strong support towards the new minimum wage and warned that any one who failed to pay the prescribed rate would be named and shamed.
SLCC’s director of education, Max Conteh, explained that prior to the new Act, Sierra Leone was the second country with the lowest minimum wage in the world. He added that for far too long employers had been exploiting employees, adding that it was time for pay back.
Conteh revealed that they were planning to set up a taskforce that would monitor employers’ compliance to the Act.
Earlier, he said, the ministry of labour and social security had issued a public notice warning employers to abide by the minimum wage law.
“It is an offence punishable by law for any employer to pay below this new national minimum wage,” he warned.
© Politico 21/01/15
