Aside from playing chess, playing the gong and dancing keep the strikers in high morale. Solidarity messages from individuals and groups visiting the picket lines further encourage the strikers to pursue their fight for higher wages and benefits. By Northern...
Malacañang resorted to statistical trickery to declare on June 15: “Unemployment rate drops to 8.3 percent.” But a closer look at the numbers shows that the jobs situation in the country is more dismal than ever. BY SANDRA NICOLAS Bulatlat.com There is, it seems,...
By Jasper Almirante/ Bulatlat Bulatlat.com President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s attempts at preempting an alleged destabilization plot by her political opponents have only put her in a position where she holds fort in a sand castle being battered by the waves....
“Tunggal dumawat tayo ti nayon a sweldo, ibaga da a bassit ti mapaspastrek a ganansiya ken maluglugi da pay” (Whenever we ask for just wage increases, the company tells us that it is not earning, that business is not good). Striking mine workers have all the more...
After stopping plantation and milling operations at Hacienda Luisita, cane workers and their families gear up for blocking the construction of one of President Macapagal-Arroyo’s flagship projects – a super expressway. By Abner Bolos Bulatlat.com The much-delayed...
Militarization heightens as Dole orders return-to-work A medical mission was prevented by the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company (LCMCo) from delivering health services to the more than 1,000 striking workers and their families. This, however, proves to be the...
Wage hike legislation nears 6 years President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo faces a punishment worse than impeachment if she continues to ignore the demand of workers for a legislated wage increase in the minimum daily wage by P125 ($2.26). A party-list legislator argued...
In the Southern Tagalog region, workers were given a minuscule increase in their minimum daily wage. What proves to be worse is that only a small segment can avail of the already miniscule increase, since those outside the so-called extended metropolitan area will...
For allegedly stealing the 2004 elections, the 14th President of the Philippines faces mounting calls for her resignation. An increasing number of groups and individuals believe there is only one penalty for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s crime of electoral fraud – her...
Labor contractualization and other new schemes in Compostela Valley’s large banana plantations are agitating both farmworkers and small growers for wage increase and union rights. By Gilbert Pacificar Bulatlat Mindanao Bureau Bulatlat.com Compostela Valley Province...
Photo by Ace Alegre / Bulatlat Bulatlat.com An old farmer in Kadaklan village, in the heart of Barlig, Mountain Province (about 13 hours ride north of Manila) arranges his rice harvest. He is preparing for the next planting season. The seeds he plants on his payao...
The government will happily announce drastically lower unemployment rates this June. But this is only because it changed the way it counts the country’s jobless, causing them to statistically disappear. BY SANDRA NICOLAS Bulatlat.com The Arroyo administration has a...
Can the striking workers at the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company (LCMCo) be blamed for defying the labor department’s order for them to return to work? They have been on strike since June 2 and despite the Benguet provincial government’s intervention, the...
By Jasper Almirante/ Bulatlat Bulatlat.com On the 17th anniversary of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), Filipino farmers remain plagued by landlessness, as land use conversion favoring multinational agri-business giants chews into the little food...
The Commission on Higher Education’s (CHEd) recent claim about a tuition increase freeze this year is turning out to be mainly for public consumption. As schools opened last week, more colleges had actually applied for tuition hike and, to top it all, this year’s...
By Jorge Martin From AxisofLogic.com Bulatlat.com On Tuesday, May 31 a series of marches and demonstrations with people numbering in the tens of thousands surrounded the Bolivian Parliament. On the third week of protests, demonstrations and roadblocks, as many as...
By Leslie Feinberg From AxisofLogic.com June 2, 2005 Issue The specter of Che Guevara—assassinated in the Bolivian jungle by the CIA four decades ago—is alive in the streets of La Paz. Bolivian workers and peasants, more than 60 percent of whom are Indi genous, are...
By Jasper Almirante/ Bulatlat Bulatlat.com For 22 million elementary and high school students on June 6, all roads lead to schools they temporarily left last summer. For the coming school year, they are expected to learn from their underpaid, overworked teachers....
By Saul Landau Progresso Weekly 26 May to 01 June 2005 Edition Bulatlat.com "So what did you think of China's recent economic foray into Latin America," I asked a university student. "Huh?" she replied. "I read something about it," said another, "but I don't...
By Luis Gomez From AxisofLogic.com Bulatlat.com In a march even bigger than yesterday’s, the residents of El Alto and the Aymara peasant farmers returned to La Paz this morning. More than 50,000 people covered an area of nearly 100 square kilometers: this time they...
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