President Benigno Aquino III . GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE
President Benigno Aquino III, whose public approval rating is slipping amid rising prices and stagnating wages, is expected to announce a package of benefits for workers on Labor Day Tuesday, as organized workers stage protest rallies nationwide to press for wage increases.
“There will be good news (for workers) definitely,” said Edwin Lacierda, the President’s spokesperson.
But Lacierda declined to say what was in store for workers. He repeatedly told reporters to just wait for the President’s announcement Tuesday.
“We will let the President do the announcement,” he said at a press briefing.
Mr. Aquino is scheduled to have a breakfast meeting with labor leaders in Malacañang Tuesday where he will announce the package of benefits for workers.
The President announced on Sunday what was in store for 1.6 million government employees.
He said the government would release one month earlier the fourth and last installment of salary increases under the Salary Standardization III program.
The pay increase for government workers will be released on June 1 instead of July 1.
This was a repeat of what President Aquino did on Labor Day in 2011 when he also announced rice subsidies for workers.
Mr. Aquino also had a breakfast meeting with labor leaders last year.
Lacierda said the breakfast meeting between the President and labor leaders would be an opportunity for the Chief Executive to “hear out what their concerns are.”
This way, the President can address the workers’ concerns, he added.
The most urgent national concern that the administration should address is controlling escalating prices, according to results of a nationwide survey conducted by Pulse Asia in March.
The Aquino administration received its lowest public approval rating on this matter.
Prices of basic goods and services have gone up mainly as a result of a series of fuel price increases, while minimum wages have stagnated.
Wage increase, job creation and poverty reduction were among the top five concerns that the administration must address, the survey found.
Wage boards
The administration has left the granting and setting of any wage increases to regional tripartite wage and productivity boards.
The board recently granted an increase of P12 in the daily minimum wage in Western Visayas, an amount workers found too little.
“It is an insult to workers. It’s not even enough to pay for the round-trip jeepney fare of P16,” Elmer Forro, spokesperson of the militant Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU-Panay), said on Monday.
The KMU is calling for the legislation of wage increases and the scrapping of the regional wage boards.
Protest marches
Forro said thousands of workers and their supporters on Panay Island would join Labor Day protests to demand a P125 across-the-board increase in the daily minimum wage, a stop to contractualization and the scrapping of the Oil Deregulation Act, which they blame for the continued increase in fuel prices.
He said KMU-Panay and Bagong Alyansang Makabayan would lead some 2,500 protesters in Iloilo and around 500 protesters each in the capital town of Kalibo in Aklan and in Roxas City in Capiz.
In Manila, a broad alliance of labor groups is expected to lead 20,000 workers in a march on Chino Roces Bridge (formerly Mendiola) also to demand higher wages and security of tenure, and to fight labor contractualization.
Something significant
In a statement, Nagkaisa said it was expecting “something good and hopeful” from the Labor Day breakfast between President Aquino and leaders of various workers’ groups.
“We are hoping that President Aquino will announce something significant, something hopeful which will uplift the morale of the workers who are sinking deeply into abject poverty due to increasing prices of commodities and the skyrocketing cost of services,” said Democrito Mendoza, president of the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines and one of the convenors of Nagkaisa.
Rene Magtubo of Partido Manggagawa said the coalition would submit to Mr. Aquino a letter that would urge the latter to certify as urgent House Bill No. 4853, the consolidated version of the security of tenure measure, and to ratify the International Labor Organization’s Convention for Domestic Workers.
The list of concerns that the group will present to Mr. Aquino includes the review of all policies on liberalization, deregulation and privatization; a substantial increase in pay for workers; and a stop to demolitions and forced evictions in urban areas.
“These problems are not intractable. If the President doesn’t act on these issues now, he faces the wrath of the workers,” said Magtubo. With a report from Jocelyn Uy