Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Media Advisory: PALEA Undas protest today


MEDIA ADVISORY
Contact Alnem Pretencio (PALEA VP) @ 09209543634


PALEA Undas protest today


WHAT: PALEA holds Undas protest to highlight outsourcing as death of job security

WHEN:  Today, October 31, 10:00 am and 6:00 pm

WHERE: PALEA protest camp

DETAILS:  PALEA will hold two protest actions this morning and afternoon with an Undas theme of “death of job security” at Philippine Airlines (PAL). Scores of PALEA members will parade a makeshift coffin marked “Demise of regular jobs” and a dozen mock tombstones with crosses bearing slogans such as “contractualization,” “outsourcing,” “corporate greed,” “arrest warrants,” and “PNoy’s anti-labor policy.”

PALEA has been holding daily marches around the airport area since a member, Romeo Sayas, was arrested October 16 on account of a criminal case filed by PAL management against 39 union members who defended the protest camp when it attacked by hired goons last October 29, 2011. The Undas protest today is an escalation of the daily PALEA protests.

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Media Advisory: "Free Romeo Sayas" candlelight protest today

WHAT: Candlelight protest to call for freedom for PALEA member Romeo Sayas

WHEN:  Today, October 19, 5:00 pm

WHERE: PAL In-Flight Center near Terminal 2

DETAILS: The candlelight protest of a couple of hundred PALEA members will call for “Free Romeo Sayas,” its member who was arrest and jailed last Tuesday in Malvar, Batangas. Another 38 PALEA members, including 2 women, also face detention once served arrest warrants issued by Pasay City Municipal Trial Court branch 44.
The harassment case of grave coercion was filed by Philippine Airlines against the PALEA 39 who valiantly defended the protest camp when it was attacked by hired goons on October 29, 2011. PALEA is going to file a motion to quash or recall warrant of arrest as holds daily indignation actions at the airport area and government agencies.

PALEA calls for release of detained member


Press Release
October 18, 2012
PALEA

The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA) called for the release of Romeo Sayas, its member arrested in Malvar, Batangas and detained since Tuesday. “Free Romeo Sayas,” chanted hundreds of PALEA members as they marched this afternoon for the second straight day in front of the Philippine Airlines (PAL) In-Flight Center near the Terminal 2 of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

Gerry Rivera, PALEA president and vice chair of Partido ng Manggagawa, said that “The arrest of Romeo is a travesty of justice and we demand his immediate release.” He explained that Sayas should not have been arrested in the first place and the charges should have been dismissed outright. Rivera quoted the Department of Justice Ministry Circular No. 15 (Series of 1982) and the Department of Labor and Employment Order No. 40-G-03 (Series of 2010) that no criminal information can be filed against workers without the required clearance from the DOLE.

Sayas and another 38 PALEA members, including two women, were issued warrants of arrest by the Pasay City Municipal Trial Court branch 44 after finding probable cause to a grave coercion case filed by Philippine Airlines against workers who defended the protest camp when it was attacked by hired goons on October 29, 2011.

Meanwhile Renato Magtubo, national chair, announced that they are coordinating with other labor groups to raise funds for Sayas’ PhP 12,000 bail bond. “I appeal to workers organizations and labor advocates to chip in for a ‘Piso para sa paglaya ni Romeo Sayas’ drive as his incarceration may complicate his diabetes and gout, and also to alleviate his family’s agony who have suffered enough from his one year of joblessness.”

With the air travel peak season approaching, Magtubo renewed the call of labor and church groups for the public to boycott PAL until the labor dispute is resolved and charges against PALEA members are dropped. “We ask OFW’s, balikbayans, students, workers and other travellers to book airlines other than PAL and Air Philippines as labor rights are being violated at the flag carrier,” he reiterated.

Rivera extolled Sayas as a “working class martyr.” “Sayas worked for 20 years as ramp equipment operator in the airport, at first as a contractual, and then he became a regular PAL employee but was finally retrenched for refusing to be outsourced. He has two children, and hails from a working class family—his brother is also a fighting PALEAn and their father formerly worked at PAL,” he stated.

PALEA lawyers are preparing to file a motion to quash or recall the warrants of arrest while protests at the DOLE and DOJ are also being planned. Aside from the case against the PALEA 39, there are is another criminal suit and a separate civil suit pending against union members, all arising out of the labor row concerning outsourcing at PAL.

ADVISORY: PALEA rally vs. arrest of member

MEDIA ADVISORY 

PALEA rally vs. arrest of member

WHAT: PALEA indignation rally vs. arrest of member

WHEN:  Today, October 18, 5:00 pm

WHERE: PAL In-Flight Center near Terminal 2

DETAILS: The PALEA rally will call for “Free Romeo Sayas,” its member who was arrest and jailed last Tuesday in Malvar, Batangas. Another 38 PALEA members, including 2 women, also face detention once served arrest warrants issued by Pasay City Municipal Trial Court branch 44. The harassment case of grave coercion was filed by Philippine Airlines against the PALEA 39 who valiantly defended the protest camp when it was attacked by hired goons on October 29, 2011. PALEA is going to file a motion to quash or recall warrant of arrest as holds daily indignation actions at the airport area and government agencies.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

PALEA condemns arrest of member


Press Release
October 17, 2012
PALEA

The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA) condemned the arrest of one of its members as it staged an indignation rally today in front of the Philippine Airlines (PAL) In-Flight Center near the Terminal 2 of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

PALEA member Romeo Sayas was arrested and jailed in Malvar, Batangas yesterday. PALEA supporters from the Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) chapter in Batangas immediately visited Sayas and reported that he is in good condition. Another 38 PALEA members, two of whom are women, also face detention once served arrest warrants issued by Pasay City Municipal Trial Court (MTC) Branch 44.

Gerry Rivera, PALEA president and PM vice chair declared that “The harassment case of grave coercion was filed by the old management of PAL against the PALEA 39 who valiantly defended the protest camp when it was attacked by hired goons on October 29, 2011.”

He also announced that PALEA is going to file a motion to quash or recall the warrant of arrest and is mobilizing its members for protests at the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) and the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Aside from the case against the PALEA 39, there are two more criminal suits pending against union members due to the labor row. Rivera called on new PAL President Ramon Ang “to facilitate the resolution of the labor dispute by dropping the trumped up charges against our members which were filed under the old company management of Jaime Bautista.”

He explained that as enunciated in under DOJ Ministry Circular No. 15 (Series of 1982) and DOLE Order No. 40-G-03 (Series of 2010), no criminal information can be filed against workers without the required clearance from the DOLE. “Absent such clearance, the courts are mandated to dismiss the charges outright. Such a policy, started after the formal lifting of martial law, aims to resolve rather than aggravate labor disputes and regulate the proclivity of capitalists to engage in harassment suits against workers,” Rivera elaborated.

PALEA also lambasted Pasay Assistant City Prosecutor Orlando Mariano and Judge Bibiano Colasito of the Pasay MTC Branch 44 for finding probable cause and ordering the issuance of arrest warrants against 39 PALEA members. “These officers of the court not only defied labor statutes but infringed on our members right to due process, and thus deserve to face administrative charges,” Rivera insisted.

He also denounced PAL lawyer Atty. Santiago “Sonny” Quial for “legal machinations.” Quial is running for district representative in Pasay for the coming elections. “As many PALEA members are Pasay voters, we will make sure that a law breaker does not become a law maker,” Rivera claimed.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

PALEA condemns arrest of member

PALEA condemns arrest and detention today of member Romeo Sayas in
Malvar, Batangas. Another 38 PALEA members, including 2 women, can
also be jailed anytime once served arrest warrants issued by Pasay
City Municipal Trial Court branch 44. The harassment case of grave
coercion was filed by Philippine Airlines against the PALEA 39 who
valiantly defended the protest camp when it was attacked by hired
goons on October 29, 2011. PALEA is going to file a motion to quash or
recall warrant of arrest even as it readies indignation actions at the
airport area and government agencies.

Monday, October 8, 2012

Social protection network pushes for agenda-based ‘13 polls

KAMP
PRESS RELEASE
08 October 2012

After an annoying week of ‘circus’ at the Commission on Elections, a network of grassroots organizations campaigning for social protection is pressing for a more empowering, agenda-based conduct of the 2013 national and local elections. In a “Caravan of Electoral Agenda” organised this morning by the Kampanya para sa Makataong Pamumuhay (KAMP), a priority list of social policy agenda was presented in public as the campaign network plans to make active intervention in next year’s polls.

The list includes the agenda on:
Decent work and guaranteed employment
Universal Health Care
Humane housing and the right to the city, and
De-privatization of essential services

“Political campaigns in the past insult the intelligence of people, candidates entertain us with song and dance numbers and empty promises. Unholy alliances among parties show that winning is more important than presenting clear and coherent programs,” declared KAMP lead convenor, Ana Maria R. Nemenzo, adding that “It’s time to make our elections agenda-based.”

The KAMP caravan with some 300 representatives coming from communities of the network made its first stop at the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) where workers demanded full compliance to government’s obligation to promote the workers’ rights and provide full employment to all Filipino workers.

“Yesterday was the World Day for Decent Work.  The celebration was obviously empty here in the Philippines where contractual/outsourced jobs dominate the industries while more and more members of the labor force are trapped in chronic unemployment and underemployment problems,” said Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) chair, Renato Magtubo.  He likewise called on the government to formulate a public employment program that can offer guaranteed public jobs for the millions of unemployed.

From the labor department, KAMP members proceeded to the Comelec where they handed a letter to Comelec Chair Sixto Brillantes, requesting the poll body to organize a series of national debate among the candidates on the said policy agenda. Nemenzo said the Comelec is in the best position to organize this national debate, “so that candidates can also be given a fair chance to explain their position on those particular issues.”  She added that better still if the poll body can organize the same at the local level to bring it closer to the people.

Magtubo on his part explained that, “A national debate is thought-provoking and participatory, and therefore will be more empowering compared to sugar-coated political ads created by spin masters.”

From the poll body, the caravan headed toward the Department of Health office in Manila where KAMP members called for more radical reforms in the country’s health care system which they said, needs to institutionalize the principle and programs of primary health care to attend to people’s health needs at the onset, before they even reach the hospital. Nemenzo pointed out that in Cuba “hospitals are considered just a step away from the cemetery.”

The group said the KP program remains limited as the system merely converges with the government’s targeted conditional cash transfer (CCT) program, and therefore is not universal.  “KAMP is pushing for a system where quality health care is accessible and available to anyone, anytime, anywhere,” explained Nemenzo, who is also the leader of WomanHealth Philippines.

The caravan’s last leg was at the National Housing Authority (NHA) where the demand for on-site/in-city housing program is being pushed by urban poor groups.

Bubuy Magahis, coordinator of Kilos Maralita said, “The present off-site relocation program denies the poor the right to the city.  Cities are not only for the 1% and the middle class.  The poor have the right to be with them and the State has the obligation to ensure that city spaces, including parks, are mutually shared by all its citizens whose majority in fact happens to be the poor.”

Friday, October 5, 2012

Akbayan disqualification is hypocritical, says labor party


Press Release
October 5, 2012

The Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) today decried as “hypocritical” the move by Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) and its allied organizations to disqualify Akbayan as a party-list group. “Our political differences with Akbayan do not detract from the fact that they are as genuine a party-list as adobo is an original Pinoy dish,” asserted Renato Magtubo, PM national chair.

“KMU claims that Akbayan is not anymore a party of the marginalized since it is in coalition with the Aquino administration and its leaders are already in government. But the same was the political objective of KMU’s allied party-list groups when it forged an alliance with a different presidential candidate who just so happened lost in the last elections,” Magtubo explained.

Meanwhile PM called on the Comelec to make good on its declaration that it will rid the party-list system of “jokes, fakes and frauds.” “It is high time that the party-list system is cleansed and loopholes are plugged so that it does not become a backdoor entry for trapos who could not compete at the congressional district level. Despite its flaws, the party-list remains an opening for progressive groups to gain a foothold in Congress so as to advance the struggle for social reforms and social change,” Magtubo insisted.

Magtubo is a nominee of the PM Coalition whose petition for accreditation as a party-list organization is pending at the Comelec. PM Coalition is comprised of labor organizations like PM, the Philippine Airlines Employees Association (PALEA), United Cavite Workers Association, Solidarity of Cebu Workers and the Yellow Bus Labor Union in Mindanao.

“We commend KMU for exposing bogus party-list organizations like Mikey Arroyo’s Ang Galing Pinoy. But we cannot support their claim against Akbayan is which simply based on partisan and sectarian politics. Even as KMU and Akbayan are in partnership with rival factions of the ruling class, open or otherwise, their constituencies and programs nonetheless both remain representative of the so-called marginalized sectors,” Magtubo added.

“I remember that Akbayan is one of a few and brave progressive parties that pioneered participation in the party-list elections at a time when others criticized it as reformism and equated revolutionism with waging guerilla war in the mountains. Of course these erstwhile extremist groups later made a 180 degree turn without explanation and then pioneered unprincipled alliances with class enemies,” Magtubo elaborated.

Together with Etta Rosales of Akbayan, Magtubo was one of the original party-list representatives who won in the first party-list elections in 1998. In their first term, Magtubo and Rosales exposed the payola attending the passage of the EPIRA Law that groups now lambast as the root cause of the high electricity costs in the country, which is the most expensive in the world.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Cybercrime law a product of low quality legislation, sloppiness of P-Noy


PRESS RELEASE
04 October 2012
  
Even as authors retract and propose amendments to Republic Act No. 10175 or the anti-cybercrime law, the militant Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) advised netizens and the general public to expect more low quality legislation and more blunders from Malacanang.
“The cybercrime law was definitely a low quality piece of legislation approved and completed into law by a signature of a sloppy President,” stated Partido ng Manggagawa chair Renato Magtubo.
The labor group believes that while the State has the right to impose regulation to any industry or any activity to promote the common good, to regulate freedom just to flush out cybercriminals however requires a very meticulous mind and a careful balancing act.
“We are also interested in seeing the faces and in penalizing cybercriminals who are victimizing women, children, OFWs and many innocent citizens.  But their confinement cannot be made a substitute to the curtailment of our freedom to express ourselves,” stressed Magtubo.
Magtubo, who is a former partylist representative, said the labor sector never expects a major change in this level of legislation with certificates of candidacies for the 2013 national and local elections filled up with the same names and parochial interests dominating the country’s elective positions.
The former lawmaker recalled the same blunder attending the passage of the infamous Electric Power Industry Reform Act or EPIRA, which Gloria Arroyo, upon signing, admitted that the law contained many flaws and loopholes. 
“Now, we’re suffering the harsh consequence of EPIRA by having the most expensive power rates in the world.  Yet Congress is not moving to repeal this law,” added Magtubo.
And as convenor of the biggest labor coalition NAGKAISA!, Magtubo also complained that while the cybercrime law was enacted in speed,  the labor-backed legislation such as the Security of Tenure Bill (SOT), the Freedom of Information (FOI) and the Reproductive Health Bill (RH) gather dust in the legislative mill.