LABOR WATCH
Bananas Stained with the
Blood of Workers
Since two
years ago when banana plantation and packing workers began forming unions
and agitating for legally mandated minimum wage rates, soldiers from the
28th Infantry Battalion have also started harassing them in
their barangays (villages). The harassments took a more violent turn with
the shooting of union president Vicente Barrios and four other unionists
as they were on their way to work. One worker, Jerson Lastimoso died and
another, Doniglenn Sundon remains in critical condition as a result of the
shooting incident during the early morning of December 15.
BY MARYA SALAMAT
Bulatlat
From his hospital bed, Vicente ‘Boy’
Barrios, 43, union president of Nagkahiusang Mamumuo ng Suyapa Farms
(United Workers of Suyapa Farms or NAMASUFA-NAFLU-KMU), was sadly saying
he owes his life to Jerson Lastimoso, a co-worker and unionist. “If not
for him, I would have been dead now.”
Barrios was with Lastimoso and three other
unionists namely, Andres Lagare, union vice-president, Aldin Cortez, union
board director, and union member Doniglenn Sundon while on their way to
work at the banana ‘Packing Plant 90’ in Compostela Valley on December 15
when they were sprayed with bullets. Earlier, Lastimoso, Cortez, Lagare,
and Sudon on board motorcycles fetched Barrios at around 5:50 a.m., in
line with a union resolution to accompany the latter to work since he has
been receiving death threats. When they arrived at Barrios’ house, they
noticed a white L300 van parked nearby. Barrios rode with Lastimoso and
the convoy of four motorcycles went on their way. As they were nearing
the intersection at Purok Albor, same province, Lagare noticed a gray L300
van parked at the side of the road. Suddenly, a black motorcycle with two
men on board, one wearing a helmet and the other a ski mask sped past
him. He shouted to warn his companions but it was too late. The
assailants fired at Barrios and Lastimoso with 45 caliber pistols before
shooting at the others after reloading their weapons
Barrios survived with a bullet piercing
his left arm and ripping off flesh from his stomach. Cortez was hit at
the upper right back. Sundon sustained a gunshot wound at the neck.
Lastimoso was hit three times at the back and another bullet pierced his
abdomen hitting one of his kidneys and his intestines. Only Lagare, who
was positioned at the back of the convoy survived unscathed. The four
were brought to Davao Regional Hospital at Tagum City, 50 kms. away.
Lastimoso died later in the afternoon. Sundon remains in critical
condition. Barrios and Cortez were declared as stable as of December 18.
A worker with the Philippines’ banana
export industry for 16 years now, Barrios led in organizing NAMASUFA two
years ago. As they began collectively pressing for unpaid benefits,
incentives and minimum wage rates, Barrios and fellow union leaders were
subjected to armed intimidation and harassments.
Poverty and repression amid growth
Miles and miles of land in
Compostela Valley in Southern Mindanao are now covered with banana plants,
producing the bulk of the Philippines’ exports of roughly 1.7 million tons
of fresh bananas from January to September, 2006 alone, based on
Department of Trade figures.
Value-wise, these banana
exports are worth close to $300 million, or a 21 percent increase over
that of 2005, said the Department of Trade.
Over the years, banana
planters, harvesters and packers, among other workers’ titles such as
banana “dehanders,” have continuously multiplied with the expansion of
banana plantations in Compostela Valley.
All these upward figures
including the rising employment in the banana export industry constitute a
trend which the Arroyo government would likely crow about as sign of an
improving economy. But how does it help improve the lives of ordinary
Filipinos, particularly of the workers behind it?
Unfortunately for workers in
the banana plantation and packing plants in Southern Mindanao, their
problems are not merely about growth failing to trickle down to their
families. Their problems seem to be about maximizing growth in profits at
their expense.
Headed mainly by Andres
Soriano’s Fresh Bananas Agricultural Company (FBAC), now under the
Japanese transnational Sumitomo Fruits Corporation, banana exporters
shoddily treat their workers who earn below the government-mandated
minimum wage. For years FBAC has been shirking in its responsibility as
employers, pointing instead to small landowners, called ‘growers,’ or to
the cabo-like labor contractors, even as it clearly controls the
production, packing and distribution of bananas for export.
But the banana plantation
workers started agitating for their legally mandated rights in 2004.
Nagkahiusang Mamumuo ng Suyapa Farms (United Workers of Suyapa Farms
NAMASUFA), led by Vicente Barrios, is one of the first successful unions
to have done so. Their success inspired workers from other packing plants
in organizing their unions and working for humane working conditions.
However, the spread of militancy in the banana export industry has spawned
militarization and armed intimidation of the workers’ communities.
Tony Pascual, secretary
general of the National Federation of Labor Unions-Kilusang Mayo Uno (NAFLU-KMU
or May 1st Movement), said banana plantation workers are
organized into unions according to their farms or packing plant number in
order to collectively press for their minimum wages and other already
legally mandated workers’ rights. But the military and other hooded armed
men would frequently order the workers to stop doing so at gunpoint. In
fact, like a chronicle of a death foretold, the armed attack on Vicente
Barrios’ convoy in December 17 had been forewarned in various
infringements by these armed groups since 2004, said Tony Pascual.
Unarmed unionists treated as
enemies of the state
“We urge all well-meaning
citizens to help press the Arroyo government to stop treating militant
unionists as enemies of the state,” said Tony Pascual. “Instead of
treating the workers as criminals whenever they act collectively, within
the bounds of law, to work for humane working conditions, we hope the
government will respect the workers’ human and trade union rights,” he
added.
Pascual said what is
happening in Southern Mindanao, where NAFLU-KMU has a regional chapter,
utterly demonstrates the Arroyo government’s “diabolical” treatment of
workers. Since two years ago when banana plantation and packing workers
began forming unions and agitating for legally mandated minimum wage
rates, soldiers from the 28th Infantry Battalion have also
started harassing them in their barangays (villages), shared Pascual.
Men with high-powered
firearms and hiding their faces in ski masks frequently barged into their
homes. Union leaders were tailed and harassed by armed men. Vicente
Barrios and fellow officers, for instance, have repeatedly been questioned
by the military and other armed men. He’d been hit with a slingshot at
least once. And recently, while other banana plantation workers in
Compostela Valley were on strike, the military jailed and tightly guarded
in a gym some 70 of the striking workers. The military reportedly told the
jailed workers, “Don’t join the union or KMU and we will not jail you!”
Pascual said, “If this is the
Arroyo government’s response to workers’ legally recognized demands for
fair wages and decent working conditions, then it’s the Arroyo government
itself who’s urging the workers to join the New People’s Army, not the KMU.”
Bulatlat
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