Bu-lat-lat (boo-lat-lat) verb: to search, probe, investigate, inquire; to unearth facts

Vol. V, No. 44      December 11 - 17, 2005      Quezon City, Philippines

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LABOR WATCH

Despite P5,000 Xmas bonus
Gov’t Employees Slam Arroyo for Low Wages

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo announced that there will be a P5,000 ($93.60) extra Christmas bonus to all government employees on or before December 15. Why are government employees, particularly public school teachers, still unhappy?

BY AUBREY SC MAKILAN
Bulatlat

Christina Manalo, 51, has been a teacher for 26 years now. She used to be indifferent to the plight of her colleagues, but two years ago, she started joining mass actions seeking to improve their rights and welfare.

Manalo, a physics teacher at the E. Rodriguez Jr. High School in Quezon City and a board member of the Quezon City Public School Teachers Association (QCPSTA), is one of the hundreds of government employees who, instead of celebrating the supposed week for them, held a rally on Dec. 7 in front of the University of Sto. Tomas in Manila to protest their worsening conditions.

According to her, pawning one’s automated teller machine (ATM) card to where a teacher’s salary is credited has been part of the teachers’ lives.

In fact, Manalo said that she has pawned her ATM card several times to augment her meager salary. Given her position as Teacher 1, she only earns P11,815 ($221.17, based on an exchange rate of P53.42 per US dollar) monthly. Taking into account all her salary deductions, she said that her take-home pay amounts to a measly P3,500 ($65.52). Unfortunately, even her P3,500 ($65.52) is used to pay off other loans.

Included in her private loans is a casket which she pays P450 ($8.42) per month for five years. Her public loans include Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) and Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (Philhealth).

“Lahat ng utangan may utang ang teacher,” she said. “Pati ang health insurance namin dahil hindi naman kami sagot ng gobyerno. Pati ataol. Bakit kapag namatay ka ba bibigyan ka ng gobyerno ng ataol?” (Teachers have loans in practically all lending agencies. We even pay for our health insurance since this is not shouldered by the government. Even our casket. Why, will the government give us a casket if we die?)

She said that even health insurance companies have a scheme. In case of emergency, Manalo said that health insurance clients are forced to shell out their money first and wait for the reimbursement later. “Kaya ka nga kumuha ng health card dahil wala kang pera.” (The reason for getting a health card is that you don’t have money.)

With the death of her father, she was forced to use her casket plan. “Kapag namatay ako, ilatag na lang ako sa kalye, tapos ibenta sa College of Medicine,” (If I die, just put me on the street and sell my body to the College of Medicine.) she said.

She also revealed that in one of the teachers’ dialogues with Education Undersecretary Fe Hidalgo, there were teachers who have started to do the laundry of other people and sell their blood just to earn money.

“Wala ka na ngang dignidad sa gobyerno, wala ka pang dignidad sa kapwa mo Pilipino.,” she said. “Nakakasuka na yon.” (The government has taken away your dignity, and you even lose your dignity to your fellow Filipinos. This is really sickening.)

Manalo said that the lowest salary of a public school teacher is P9,939 ($186.05). The take-home pay is not enough to meet basic needs, according to her.

“Nakapakong suweldo sa patuloy na lumolobong presyo ng mga bilihin, paano ka mabubuhay sa ganyang klase ng sistema?” she said. “What is P3,000 ($56.16) across the board? Hindi naman makakabuhay yan.” (Wages remain the same despite the increased prices of commodities, so how can you survive under that system?. What is P3,000 or $56.16 across the board [monthly increase demanded by government employees]? You still cannot survive with that.)

Ferdinand Gaite, national president of Courage, said that economic difficulty remains the main problem of public employees.

Gaite said that it has been four years and four months since they last had a salary increase. He said that the lowest monthly salary received by government employees is P5,082 ($95.13). Normally, the government employee who earns this amount only has P3,000 ($56.16) left after deductions.

According to the National Wages and Productivity Commission (NWPC), the family living wage in the National Capital Region (NCR) as of October 2005 amounts to P20,520 ($384.12).

With the already low wages, Gaite said that they have also not received for 10 years the backpay of their cost-of-living allowance (COLA) since Republic Act (RA) No. 6758 or the Salary Standardization Law was passed in 1989.

The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) issued Corporate Compensation Circular No. 10 on November 1, 1989 which discontinued all allowances and fringe benefits granted on top of basic salary aside from those enumerated in the circular. It even said that “payment made for such allowance/fringe benefits after said date shall be considered as illegal disbursement of public funds.”

But the Supreme Court held in 1998 that until and unless the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) issued implementing rules categorically excluding the COLA and the amelioration allowance from standardized salaries, “there could not have been any valid notice to the government employees concerned that indeed those allowances were deemed included in the standardized salary rates.”

However, Gaite said the Court decision has not been implemented.

Extra bonus

The president announced Dec. 8 during the anniversary of the Philippine Government Employees Association (PGEA) that it granted P5,000 ($93.60) additional extra Christmas bonus to government employees and shall be received before the year ends.

But Gaite instead said that government employees were “once again insulted by this shabby treatment, as if we’ll be appease with mere crumbs.”

He added that if ever reports that the amount for the bonus will be taken from the combined savings of the national government agencies, “then the employees have nobody to thank for except themselves for prudently spending the peoples’ money while those in Malacañang have been on a spending binge.”

He added that the austerity measures imposed by the government for the past two years have taken its toll more on the employees because this meant no training or seminars, no scholarships, no additional benefits and even a 10 hour-four day work week schedule, “like cutting our fingers to feed our children.”

Government employees are also waiting for the promised salary increase. Arroyo announced that the government had allotted 13 billion pesos for the salary increase of its employees in the proposed 2006 budget.

The 2006 budget, however, is still being deliberated in the Congress.

No good model

Manalo’s political awakening made her aware of the situation of the country’s workers.

“We really have to raise the socio-economic and political maturity of the teachers,” she said. “The government wants quality education but it does not provide quality treatment to its workers.”

She stressed the importance of teaching critical thinking to students. “Never mind if you get zero in the exam, I don’t care, for as long as you don’t cheat,” she said. “Because once you cheat, you go to Malacañang. If you’re a cheater, you’re a liar, once of these days, you will become the president of this country.” Bulatlat

 

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