A month before the start of the campaign period for local candidates, Makati Mayor Romulo Peña Jr. signed on Friday a school board resolution releasing P117 million in teachers’ allowances that he said had remained unpaid for the last 18 years.
Peña said the money was for some 3,250 public elementary and high school teachers in the city who did not receive their allowances in full from 1998 to 2014.
It is part of a P499.4-million supplemental budget that is also earmarked for the improvement of school buildings and purchase of school supplies. Each teacher would get between P60,000 and P100,000 in their March payroll, he added.
From being the vice mayor, Peña took over after Junjun Binay, son of Vice President and now presidential candidate Jejomar Binay, was suspended as mayor by the Ombudsman last year in connection with allegedly graft-tainted building projects of the local government.
He is running for mayor in the May 9 elections, a showdown mainly with Junjun’s sister, Rep. Abby Binay, whose family had dominated Makati politics for 30 years.
Peña declined to comment when asked what stopped the payment of the allowances beginning 1998, the year the Binay matriarch, Elenita, was mayor.
“The only thing we want to say is that in Makati, under the new Makati, we all want to give not only the benefits due the teachers, but also those for city government employees and barangay residents.”