Power rates are expected to increase this December not only due to the value-added tax but also the government’s approval of the National Power Corporation’s application to increase power rates. At this point, even business leaders and power companies have denounced the government’s failure to lower prices of electricity. BY JHONG DELA CRUZ In their…

Residents of an impoverished area are still deprived of steady water supply even if they regularly pay the rates imposed by the water company. While they initially welcomed their mayor’s support, they lament the inaction on the part of the water company and the mayor’s decision to use their plight as a way to increase…

The demise of Philippine-made shoes is a result of decades of government neglect and intensified by just a few years of aggressive liberalization under the World Trade Organization. By JP Andaquig IBON Features Shoemaking has always been the bread and butter of 40-year-old Johnny Gaudia. Like nearly everyone else in Marikina City, shoemaking for Gaudia…

IBON, a member of the local anti-WTO network Resist WTO! and the global coalition Our World Is Not For Sale , challenges the country’s negotiators at the WTO ministerial to resist the further extension of trade liberalization into manufactured goods and fisheries and instead focus on finding meaningful ways to develop the country’s manufacturing sector.…

Workers of a clothing factory chose to fight for their benefits and went on strike, a decidedly unfashionable course of action these days. They won – in just three days. by Dennis Espada CABUYAO, Laguna – Workers of a clothing factory producing Tommy Hilfiger shirts decided to engage in what is today an unfashionable course…

A human rights advocate, genuine union leader and peasant organizer. Written on a piece of cardboard, the words caught the eyes of visitors arriving at the home of murdered activist Albert Terradaño in Tayum, Abra. And they learned what the words meant when they spoke with his family, friends and comrades. By Kim Quitasol Northern…