No, Hontiveros and Pangilinan didn’t seek to abolish 13th month pay

MANILA, Philippines — A social media viral post that says Senators Risa Hontiveros and Francis Pangilinan filed a bill seeking to abolish the 13th month pay of workers is not true.

In a fact-check, Agence France Presse (AFP) debunked Monday the Facebook post that even called the opposition senators “stupid” for supposedly moving to eliminate the workers’ compensation provided under the law.

The misleading post that features Hontiveros and Pangilinan was captioned: “Senators Kiko Pangilinan and Risa Hontiveros File Bill to Abolish 13th Month Pay,” according to AFP.

It even mistakenly identified Hontiveros as a member of the Liberal Party (LP), a political opposition in the Duterte administration. Hontiveros belongs to Akbayan party-list, AFP added.

“Bobo talaga ‘to e halos lahat ng botante nais tumanggap ng 13 mo. pay as part of rewarding them by companies or offices they work for. Yung iba nga me 14-16 mo. pay end of the year tapos tatanggalin, pahirap sa bayan ang mga LP na to,” the post also said.

(These two are really stupid as all voters want to receive 13th month pay as part of reward from companies or offices they work for. Some people even have 14th-16th month pay at the end of the year but then they want it removed, these LP people are really a burden to the nation.)

But the French news agency found through a quick search in the Senate’s online archives that a proposed measure purportedly to abolish workers’ 13th month pay was never filed at all by any legislator of the 17th Congress.

Further, AFP said Lui Belmonte, Hontiveros’ spokesperson, denied the allegations saying: “Nope… no such bill filed.”

Likewise, Julie Laconico, Pangilinan’s spokesperson, discredited the information indicated in the Facebook post and told AFP the bill is “not true.”

Citing data from CrowdTangle, AFP said multiple Facebook groups supporting President Rodrigo Duterte that have more than 300,000 followers shared the fake news. /kga