MANILA, Philippines — Department of Transportation (DOTr) Secretary Arthur Tugade on Tuesday ordered the Philippine National Railway (PNR), Light Rail Transit Authority (LRTA) and MRT-3 to hire qualified workers who may be retrenched by LRT-1.
This comes as LRT-1 announced Tuesday than more than 100 of its workers will lose their jobs by next month.
“Hire qualified personnel to our rail lines and projects. Kawawa ang mga tao. Kung kailan pandemya, tsaka pa sila mawawalan ng trabaho,” Tugade said in a statement.
(They are pitiful. They lost jobs in the middle of a pandemic.)
“We must look into the possibility of absorbing them as quickly as we can. Huwag natin silang pabayaan (We must not leave them behind). It’s the least and most humane thing we can do for them at this time,” he added.
The Light Rail Manila Corp. (LRMC) said the more than 100 LRT-1 workers will be laid off due to the decline in the train line’s ridership brought by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tugade also called on LRMC to subject all its personnel to swabbing.
“They should swab all their people. Cost is not the primary issue here. We can discuss who absorbs the cost at some later time. What matters most is the health and safety of commuters and their employees,” he said.