QC unity walk pushes ‘Ro-Ro’ as best bets for laborers

AROUND 8,000 people clad in yellow shirts gathered at the Quezon City Hall grounds on Sunday to express their support for administration candidates Mar Roxas and Leni Robredo whom they believed were the “best candidates” to address the country’s labor problems.

The “Unity Walk and Ride for Mar-Leni” was spearheaded by a coalition of around 200 organizations and a community of Roxas-Robredo supporters who called themselves “The Silent Majority.”

One of the event’s lead organizers, Antonette Marcella, told the Inquirer that it symbolically represented their belief that “Ro-Ro,” as their followers referred to them, were the ones with the “most viable platform” for the labor sector.

Marcella, who is part of the Volunteers for Mar group, said that Roxas, having served as trade secretary, knows what should be done to increase employment opportunities in the country.

She pointed out as an example his role in helping develop the business process outsourcing sector which is now one of the country’s top industries.

“Whatever his critics say, Roxas was very instrumental in making that industry grow,” Marcella said at the sidelines of the unity walk.

She also described as a good program his proposal of giving an incentive of as much as P100,000 to class valedictorians to help them forge their future.

DRESSED in yellow to show his support, a disabled man joins the unity walk for LP bets Roxas-Robredo. JING NAGUIAT/oras na, roxas na Facebook page

In his speech, Roxas told his supporters led by President Manuel Quezon’s daughter Zenaida Quezon Avanceña, economist Solita Monsod and singers Jim Paredes and Noel Cabangon that poverty was not the fate of hardworking Filipinos who were willing to make sacrifices just to ensure a better life for their families.

“The fault is not in you. The fault is not in our stars. The fault is in rotten government [that is why] we need to continue our fight against corruption, deception, lies and abuse. These are the reasons why our country continues to suffer,” Roxas said.

For Marcella, she believes that the best solution to the country’s pressing problems such as crime and poverty is the creation of jobs which she says Roxas can do.

“We have to elect somebody who can create jobs. Nobody wants to grow up a criminal. You don’t kill people because they’re criminals. They become criminals for a reason. Hence, you have to set up the structure so that they don’t become criminals,” Marcella said, apparently alluding to trash-talking Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte  who promised to rid the country of crime and corruption within six months by killing off criminals.

Meanwhile, Robredo, who attended a labor assembly at Welcome Rotunda, pushed for the passage of a security of tenure bill to address the gaps in the country’s labor laws and protect workers from exploitation.

She added that the labor law should also be revisited since there were “unfavorable procedural aspects” that placed employees at the losing end of labor-related disputes in the National Labor Relations Commission.