“Various people’s movements and humanitarian organizations have been hard at work for almost a year in various bayanihan (mutual aid) efforts for rehabilitation and reconstruction. Meanwhile, the Aquino government continues to hide behind these initiatives in a clear attempt to abandon its mandate to ensure the people’s right to housing and other social services.”
“Social justice dictates that those who create the nation’s wealth be granted at least their right to a minimum wage amidst the increasing profits and wealth of a handful of capitalists and bureaucrats. We have every reason to believe that capitalists and the government can grant our just demand,.” – Ferdinand Gaite, Courage
“We are calling for reinstatement because we should not have been dismissed in the first place. We are calling for regularization because we deserve to become regulars for the years of hard work we rendered to the company.” – Jhondel Estabaya, 33, president of SAMA-Ako (Samahan ng Manggagawang Kontraktwal) in Wyeth.
“While we should look for solutions if there is an impending crisis, we should guard against short term knee jerk solutions that make energy costly.” – Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares
“After imposing slave-like conditions on workers, the Cenapro management is acting like a dictator in punishing workers for holding legitimate protests against such conditions. It not only wants workers to suffer, it wants workers to suffer in silence.” – Kilusang Mayo Uno
“The problem with Malacañang’s proposal to allow the President to enter into P6 billion to P10 billion ($136 million to $227 million) worth of negotiated power contracts is that it is based on Energy Secretary Jericho Petilla’s mere insistence of a power shortage that is not supported by verifiable data.”
“Ninety-nine percent of the guidelines during strikes expressly provide what the workers are prohibited to do. There is no corresponding magnitude of responsibility that refers to how the management should behave when a strike is declared.”
“With more than a million passengers riding all three lines a day, the MRT and LRT generate more than enough income for their operations and maintenance. That’s the reason why big businesses are drooling over and trying to buy them.”
The word “Endo,” short for “end of contract,” was declared in “Sawikaan 2014: Pagpili ng Salita ng Taon” as word of the year. This word leaves a bitter taste in the mouth of Filipino workers whose various groups united to protest the incidences of “Endo” on Oct. 7, world day for decent work.
'Nearly a year after the furor over DAP, no one has been made to account for it, no case has been filed against those involved and against its architect.' - Bayan Metro Manila
NXP Semiconductors Phils. agrees to hike workers wage by 5.25-percent for 2014, and 3.5-percent for 2015 and 2016. It reinstated only half of the 24 union officers it fired last May 5.
“We will not make compromises on the matter of our job security and our right to unionize. We will not allow RMN to accomplish its ultimate objective of busting our union and depriving us of our rights arising from being unionized.”
The company suspended Collective Bargaining Agreement talks after the union and other workers held a protest action on July 16 denouncing the 16-hour work and forced overtime in the company.
“We maintain that the concession agreement is grossly disadvantageous to the public. It will be disastrous for commuters.” – Renato Reyes, Bagong Alyansang Makabayan
The public-private deal concerning LRT will give the Ayala-MVP Group the benefit of the government’s official development assistance (ODA) in financing more than half of the total project cost of about P65-billion. The government committed to shoulder the right of way acquisition, purchase of coaches, civil works, among other expenses.
See also: Bayan rues ‘End of an era’ as Aquino privatizes LRT 1
The scheme will deny workers at least four days’ worth of salary in a month, in exchange for a dubious overtime pay, which may not adequately pay for their health care should they become sick or meet accidents due to fatigue.
Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares summarizes what is wrong with the approved 2015 budget with the acronym PPP: wrong Policies, wrong Priorities, and huge Pork barrel.
“The Department of Energy (DOE) has not sufficiently laid out the reason for emergency powers because as their own data show, there is enough power supply.” – Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares
A whopping 68 percent of the Agriculture department's budget for Yolanda victims were still unreleased, even as the Yolanda-affected areas remain largely unassisted.
“We should have an honest to goodness analysis of the national budget because we owe it to the Filipino people, who want the pork barrel system and lump sums abolished.” – Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares
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