ANGELES CITY—Holy Angel University (HAU) allowed striking teachers and employees to enter the campus on Monday but confined them to offices to undergo three to five days of “debriefing,” a union official said.
The 333 leaders and members of the HAU Teachers and Employees Union and nonunion strikers tried to go back to work as early as Saturday, or a day after acting Labor Secretary Danilo Cruz assumed jurisdiction over the labor dispute on Oct. 4, but university officials stopped them.
In a five-page order, Cruz said he made his move in the interest of students and parents following their appeals in the Department of Labor and Employment for the resumption of classes before the final examinations scheduled for Oct. 10-14.
The acting labor chief issued the assumption-of-jurisdiction (AJ) order on the 51st day of the strike. HAU, chaired by businessman Manuel Pangilinan, has 17,000 students and 947 employees.
University spokesperson Edna Marizza Santos did not reply when asked about the debriefing activity.
The union president, Dr. Edmundo Maniago, described the situation on Monday as “confusing.”
“Several clusters reported that the management informed them that it has not received a copy of the AJ. The others were not allowed to work if they have not finished a debriefing process in three to five days,” he said.
“We have only five days left before this semester ends. It seems the management doesn’t want us to return to the classrooms until the semester is over,” Maniago said.
The demands of the union—a recomputation of the 70-percent incremental proceeds as shares of teachers and employees from the increase in tuition for school year 2012-13 and a provision of P5.4 million for the union—have yet to be given.
On the other hand, the National Labor Relations Commission cleared HAU of unfair labor practice, a decision that the union is challenging in the Court of Appeals.
Maniago said the negotiations would not be over despite their return to work. “It is only complying with the order of the secretary of labor to return to work, otherwise striking employees will lose their employment,” he said. Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon