(We yield this space to the statement of Kilusang Mayo Uno due to its timeliness. – Ed.)
IN HIS third State of the Nation Address, the President asserted that the government’s “campaign against ‘endo’ has resulted in the regularization of more than 300,000 workers as of [July].”
But where are these 300,000 workers?
The truth is the opposite — thousands upon thousands of contractual workers have been laid off over the past two years. From a multinational cola company to a giant food chain and a telecom firm, hardworking and long-time employees have been terminated in massive numbers, under illegal labor-only contracting (LOC) schemes which Duterte has tacitly condoned and legitimized.
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) has failed to substantiate the 300,000 figures. Even before the SONA, it had also failed to prove much of its claims regarding the number of regularized workers. We challenge DOLE and the President to provide a list of these 300,000 workers. While they look, we also urge them to listen and talk to the thousands of contractual workers across the country who have been illegally laid off.
The President made a big show of passing the responsibility for ending labor contractualization on to Congress. Again, he lied by claiming that it was “impossible” for him as President to achieve that purpose.
Duterte is a Pontius Pilate. He is attempting to wash his hands off the issue. We already know that he has no qualms about aggressively pushing or sidestepping Congress when he wants to, on issues such as the declaration of Martial Law in Mindanao. We already know that Congress is populated with his allies, which is why he had no trouble installing his cohort and handler, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, as House Speaker.
The President claims Executive Order 51 (EO 51) is an achievement which “sought to protect the workers’ right to security of tenure.” This is another blatant falsehood. In fact, his EO 51 was a rejection of an alternative version proposed by the united labor sector. He asked Kilusang Mayo Uno and other labor centers for a unified draft, which he then replaced with a watered-down version that weakened the language on security of tenure, removed direct hiring as the norm, and was lacking in any provision for funding and ensuring the implementation of the EO.
His EO 51 — in conjunction with the equally toothless Department Order 174 (DO 174) of DOLE — has made things worse instead of better for Filipino contractual workers. In the three months since Duterte signed E0 51, the vast majority of contractuals covered by DOLE regularization orders have been fired instead of regularized.
Until the illegally dismissed workers are reinstated, and contractual workers are regularized, EO 51 is worthless to the Filipino people.
Our response to the SONA is the continuation of our united and just struggle to uphold and protect the rights of Filipino workers.
