SPECIAL
REPORT
Bleak Christmas for
Workers in CL Economic Enclaves
(First of two parts)
This Christmas season,
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo paints a rosy picture for workers
especially in so-called “industrial enclaves” such as the Clark Special
Economic Zone (CSEZ) in Pampanga and the Subic Bay Free Port Economic Zone
(SBFEZ). But the realities workers have to contend with in these
industrial enclaves are low wages, harsh working conditions and
curtailment of their right to unionize and bargain for better working
conditions.
BY FRED VILLAREAL
Gitnang Luson News Service
Posted by Bulatlat
OLONGAPO CITY (126 kms.
north of Manila) – This Christmas season, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
paints a rosy picture for workers especially in so-called “industrial
enclaves” such as the Clark Special Economic Zone (CSEZ) in Pampanga and
the Subic Bay Free Port Economic Zone (SBFEZ). But the realities workers
have to contend with in these industrial enclaves are low wages, harsh
working conditions and curtailment of their right to unionize and bargain
for better working conditions.
Joaquin Arcega, 42,
married with three children and Johnny Batislaong, 46, married with four
kids, work as cutters at the Citigloves Garment factory inside CSEZ
producing cold weather leather gloves for export. The company is owned by
a local businessman and employs some 50 workers.
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TAKING A BREAK: Workers of the Subic Bay Free Port Economic Zone buy
some snacks during a recess from the gruelling and almost thankless
work in the factory
BULATLAT FILE PHOTO |
Arcega has worked for
Citigloves for 10 years. He earns P250 ($5.06 an exchange rate of
$1=P49.365) a day if he completes a quota of 30 pairs of gloves.
Batislaong gets P243 ($4.92) a day for the same quota. If they don’t meet
the quota, they are paid only P8 ($0.16) a pair. They are entitled to a
P45 ($0.91) emergency cost of living allowance (ECOLA) per day, but not on
days they are unable to work. The number of days of absence is also
deducted from their 13th month pay.
Eight months work
“We work for only
eight months a year at the most,” Arcega told GLNS in an interview.
Production starts in February, peaks from May to July and tapers off from
August to October. From November to January of the next year, including
the Christmas season, there’s no more work and the company expects them to
find work elsewhere.
Whenever they could,
they try to complete three quotas to increase their daily earnings. From
7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. they work for a double quota and work two hours
more for a third. The company requires them to punch out their time cards
at 4 p.m. even if the workers are still at work hours later to evade
overtime pay. They are asked to complete just one quota a day as the
season tapers off.
Jobseekers check out the lists of openings at the Subic Bay Free Port
Economic Zone
BULATLAT FILE PHOTO |
“The management is
friendly as the season starts then toss us like garbage as soon as
production requirements are met,” Batislaong said.
They are allowed a
15-minute break in the morning and lunch from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. But
management closes the women’s comfort rooms at a quarter before the 4 p.m.
official closing time to ensure that they work their butts out to the last
tick of the working shift.
Deductions
“The management is
prompt in deducting from our pay the member’s share in the fees for Social
Security Service (SSS), Pag-ibig, among others. But we don’t know if the
company remitted these or if they paid the employer’s share. Anybody who
dared to inquire was bullied,” Batislaong said.
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Workers suspect that
the SSS fees collected from them are not remitted on time and are being
pooled by the management and loaned to workers. The management collects a
20-percent interest for loans.
Arcega found out that
he was deducted an excess of P1,000 ($20.257) for the contributions at
least once. The management was forced to admit mistakes in computation
when he demanded an explanation. He has yet to receive a refund despite
the management’s word to do so.
Bastislaong’s
production summary from March 11-25, 2006 showed that he was able to cut
972 pairs of gloves or roughly 33 quotas (at 30 per quota), or an average
2.5 quotas a day. He hopes to average two quotas a day, even during the
low production period.
Piteous wages
His pay slip for
April 10, 2006 showed a take-home pay of P7,558.06 ($153.10) after the
usual deductions or an estimated total income of P37,790.30 ($765.528)
from February to October granting all factors were constant. Thus a worker
of his status earns P3,150 ($63.81) per month or a piteous P105 ($2.127)
daily.
“A pair of low
quality cold weather gloves is sold by the company at about P500
($10.128), thus, management can pay the equivalent of my two production
quotas – 60 pairs – on the sale of a pair of gloves alone,” Arcega said.
“During the lean
season of 2001 the company was unable to pay us for months. We had to rely
on cash advances to buy our families a kilo or two of rice, a few dried
fish and noodles. We ended up more indebted than usual both to the company
and the stores where we get our food,” the two recounted.
No union
The workers believe
that only through a union can they hope to fight for better wages and
working conditions. But when they first attempted to form a union in 2004
management moved swiftly to preempt them.
Batislaong, who
volunteered to do the initial organizing work, was pinned down as the
leader and was immediately summoned and reprimanded.
He was not allowed to
work for sometime and is still being closely monitored and harassed to
this day.
The exploitation and
repression of workers at the CSEZ reflects the conditions elsewhere in the
enclave and at the Subic Bay economic zone in Olongapo City.
Legenda workers
Greg Fundacion, 45,
is one of the officers of the Kilusang Manggagawa sa Legenda (KML or
Workers’ Movement in Legenda) the union of workers of the Legenda
Hotel/Casino in Subic owned by the Chan family, Malaysians of Chinese
descent.
KLM has about 800
active members in more than eight departments in the casino –
administrative, finance, human resources, food and beverage, house keeping
and laundry, transportation, internal security, engineering, motor pool,
and croupiers.
Two hundred of their
members are contractuals particularly those in food and beverage, house
keeping and security departments although many have worked for the company
for more than 13 years. The country’s labor laws provide that contruactual
workers are to
Every worker has to
inch through six steps of job items from Level 1 to 6 with rates per day
ranging from P224.50 ($4.54) to P300.00 ($6.07).
In December 26, 2003
the KML gathered the signature of 1,500 employees for a certification
election as the initial step in the formation of their union.
They engaged
management in collective bargaining agreement (CBA) negotiations in April
2004 to demand an economic package that includeD: union leave with pay, 15
days sick leave and 15 days vacation leave per year, 45 days maternity
leave for regular pregnancy and 75 days leave for caesarian section, seven
days leave for paternity, five days emergency leave and four days
bereavement leave.
They also pushed for
security of tenure and union security.
Unimplemented CBA
Management refused to
recognize the union and implement the CBA.
In August 2004, the
workers filed a notice of strike but the Department of Labor and
Employment (DoLE) issued an assumption of jurisdiction order on the
dispute. The company later brought the labor dispute to the courts.
To this day, the
company stubbornly maintains its position of not recognizing the union
even with the CBA concluded, Fundacion said.
For the past two and
a half years, the workers experienced” systematic” repression, Fundacion
said. He said union leaders are being investigated by the police and
military intelligence operatives.
The workers were
subjected to surveillance, persuaded and even threatened to refrain from
union activities. A high-ranking union leader was demoted and is
continuously being harassed.
The workers are still
battling management for non-implementation of the CBA particularly the
P30.00 ($0.61)-per-day basic pay increase to be given on a staggered basis
of P5 ($0.10); P10 ($0.20) and P15 ($0.30) each year for three years.
Also unimplemented
are the 25-percent increase on overtime; 20 percent on holidays, 30
percent on non-working holidays; and 30 percent on working day off.
The management
refuses to recognize the KML and to implement the CBA plus the P18.50
($0.37)ECOLA provided for by Wage Order No. 12 despite the National Labor
Relations Comission (NLRC)’s recognition of the certification election
which was also upheld by DoLE Region III and the Court of Appeals.
Fundacion said
management continuously violates the workers’ rights. They are meted 30 to
60 days suspension for the flimsiest of reasons, and charged with
administrative sanctions and even illegal dismissal.
Subic Bay Apparel
Terry Calzado, 39, is
one of the 500 workers of the Subic Bay Apparel Corporation, a
Filipino-Chinese and American owned firm producing coats and tuxedoes for
export.
Calzado like many of
the firm’s workers have worked for at least 10 years for the company. They
started at P95 per day and now get P239.50 ($4.85) a day plus P20 ($0.40)
ECOLA (expanded cost-of-living allowance). They get P37 ($0.75) per hour
on overtime. They receive their 13th-month pay but no added
incentives on holidays.
The company has three
departments: cutting, pants, coat and finishing. The cutting department
has three shifts a day, while the pants and coat department have but a
single daily shift.
A third but a minor
unit is the finishing department with no particular shift and where the
workers are paid P0.75 ($0.02) a piece.
Quota
She works on the 7
a.m.-3 p.m. shift. On peak seasons from September-December she can only
complete 700 pairs at most of her quota of 800 pairs on her regular shift,
and just 200 pairs on the quota of 500 pairs on the 3-8 p.m. overtime
shift.
Calzado’s pay slip
for three consecutive pay days from September 16-30; October 1-15 and
October 16-31 of 2006 showed net incomes of P1,899.85 ($38.49); P3,062.08
($62.03) and P3,202.78 ($64.88) respectively after deductions, an average
of P2,721.57 ($55.13) every 15th or P181.44 ($3.68) daily take home.
They get a 30-minute
lunch break from 11:30-12 p.m. on a regular shift; 15 minutes (3-3:15
p.m.) between 3-6 p.m. and another 10 minutes (6-6:10 p.m.) between 6-8
p.m. on overtimes.
They are issued a
comfort room pass and a cooler (water dispenser) pass for every 30
persons. Violations of these policies can result to reprimand of the
workers for “wasting of time” or malingering
Workers are entitled
to a vacation leave and sick leave of five days each; mothers get a
maternity leave of two months for a normal delivery and 78 days for
caesarian operations; fathers get seven days paternity leave.
Fight for union
registration
“We started our union
activities on October 2003 under the Trade Union Congress of the
Philippines (TUCP),” Calzado said. “Our certification election was
cancelled as the petition prepared by the TUCP contained next to nothing.
They also failed to defend our union’s registration.”
In March 2004, the
Philippine Transport Genuine Workers Organization (PTGWO), another TUCP-led
group, tried to reorganize the union with the help of management but a
timely petition for certification elections by the Workers’ Alliance in
Region III (WAR III) led to the registration of the union.
The management in
collusion with the TUCP tried to have the union registration revoked,
Calzado said. The case is now at the Court of Appeals awaiting decision.
“We had to contend
not only with management but with pro-management labor groups,” Calzado
said. Gitnang Luson News Service / Posted by Bulatlat
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