Struggling Baliwag Transit to settle benefits of 47 separated employees

IDLE BUSES Baliwag Transit buses are yet to ply all routes because of the pandemic. Many of its about 500 buses have to remain parked at the terminal garage in San Rafael town in this photo taken last week. —CARMELA REYES-ESTROPE

BALIWAG, BULACAN—Baliwag Transit Inc., which owns one of Central Luzon’s biggest fleet of buses, has promised to settle the retirement and separation pay benefits of 47 former drivers and conductors who lost their jobs or have resigned when the country’s public transport industry was shut down last year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The company had been beset by complaints of unpaid wages, and had agreed to release in tranches the full balance of benefits due to their 47 former workers beginning on July 12, said Aries Ramos, 60, who worked for the company for 20 years as driver for the Cabanatuan City-Cubao bus route.

He said Jose Abenales, Baliwag Transit union leader, relayed the information to him last week just as they were trying to arrange a meeting with the bus company’s management.

“We are finally assured that our remaining salaries will be given, which is why we no longer pursued a meeting with management. We are amenable to that payment scheme as long as we are paid. But we are hoping it would not take too long,” Ramos said.

According to Ramos, the 47 separated employees are expected to receive from P150,000 to about P900,000, depending on their length of service. In Ramos’ case, he said his retirement benefits amounted to P600,000.

Tragedy

The settlement would be made while the company mourns the deaths of four members of the Tengco family, who have operated the bus line for 60 years.

On Sept. 12 last year, company manager Joselito Tengco, 74, died. A month earlier, on Aug. 19, his 49-year-old son Allan Jorge Rodriguez Tengco, who was also the president of Bulacan Tourism Council, died of a heart attack.

On Jan. 8 this year, Joselito’s younger brother, former Baliwag Mayor Edilberto Tengco, died at the age of 73.

On March 20, Maria Victoria “Lola Turing” Santiago Vda. de Tengco—the family matriarch who founded Baliwag Transit in 1960— also died. She was 98.

The Inquirer tried but failed to get a comment from officials of the bus firm at its office in Barangay Sabang.

Geraldine Panlilio, Central Luzon director of the Department of Labor and Employment said she would look into Baliwag Transit’s wage issue.

Ramos said he and fellow drivers approached management about their unpaid benefits last month but bus officials did not face them. A video posted online by the separated employees that addressed their plight forced the company to release P100,000 to each of its former workers on May 13.

Fleet grounded

When Luzon was locked down in March last year, followed by quarantines, all 500 buses in Baliwag Transit’s fleet were grounded, affecting nearly 2,000 employees.

Baliwag Transit operations resumed in December last year but for limited trips.

Some employees may have to fight for higher benefits. Rolando Mendoza, 53, a resigned bus conductor, said he planned to contest the P155,000 separation pay promised him, which he described as “too small.”

Now that the pandemic has entered its second year, more bus drivers and conductors have decided to leave the company, Mendoza said.

Others simply stopped showing up, he said, because of the risk of contracting COVID-19 while driving passengers to Manila.

Erick Toledo, 60, who had driven a Baliwag Transit bus for 29 years, said he expected to receive P900,000 from the company.

Felixberto Ileto Jr., a 52-year-old bus driver who also served for 29 years, said he expected more than P300,000 in separation pay.

“We deserve these amounts of money that are due us for the long period of service we gave to the company,” Ileto said.

—CARMELA REYES-ESTROPE INQ