MANILA – Media giant ABS-CBN Corp. may consider retrenching workers by August if it fails to resume broadcast soon, according to the company’s President and CEO Carlo Katigbak.
Katigbak said during the hearing conducted by the Senate committee on public services the media network is suffering from revenue losses due to the shutdown and the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
“When we were taken off the air on May 5th, we made a commitment to our employees, given the difficult economic situation following COVID-19, we made a commitment to them that we would not take away any jobs for three months,” Katigbak said.
“We continue to lose a substantial amount of money every month and I’m afraid if we cannot go back on air soon, by August we may already have to consider beginning a retrenchment process,” he added.
According to Katigbak, there are 5,000 employees under the ABS-CBN and 11,000 more under the ABS-CBN group of companies who were suffering from the shutdown.
The ABS-CBN official said that, while they were targeting to secure another 25-year legislative franchise, they are willing to accept the five-month interim measure being discussed in the House of Representatives.
“At this point, the most important priority for ABS-CBN is to return on air as quickly as possible. We need to do this so that we can again start earning revenues so that we can continue paying salaries of our employees,” Katigbak said.
“If the provisional franchise valid until October is the quickest way to get us back on air then we accept that with the hope that Congress would continue hearings so that eventually we can secure hopefully our 25-year franchise,” he added.
The House of Representatives has approved last week on first and second reading a measure granting ABS-CBN a provisional franchise until Oct. 31, 2020. It was however was recalled from second reading on Monday.
On May, ABS-CBN halted its operations after the National Telecommunications Commission issued a cease and desist order instead of a provisional authority to operate./PN
