Diversion, fake news should not distract Philhealth investigation

It is in the interest of the working class who are the real owner-beneficiaries of the health insurance fund that investigation into the whooping P15-B Philhealth scam proceed unhampered and result to the ultimate prosecution of its corrupt officials.  With the fund’s life threatened by billions of losses due to alleged corruption, so as the health security of our millions of workers especially during a pandemic.

It is for this reason that we call on Congress as well as the Executive to ensure that neither delay nor diversion affect the ongoing investigation as the Filipino people deserve truth and justice on this issue.

We are alarmed, however, that alongside the ongoing investigation is the resurgence of vicious attacks against Sen. Risa Hontiveros whose issues during her stint at Philhealth have already been cleared by the COA and the fund itself. Is it part of a diversion, or simply an increase in production of fake news from a host of click farms?

We are likewise concerned with the statements of several congressmen calling for the abolition of Philhealth by replacing it with a new one. A health crisis is certainly not a good time to kill a health insurance system. Justice and total cleansing, we contend, is what will save the system from ultimate collapse.

07 August 2020

Press Release: Partylist opens electoral bid with grassroots campaign

Press Release

February 12, 2019

Partido Manggagawa partylist

Contact Dhel Pulanco (PUP) @ 09179402632

Ver Estorosas (Bulacan) @ 09339680449

Dennis Sequena (Cavite) @ 09301803071

The partylist group PM opened its electoral bid for “genuine representation for the marginalized” with a grassroots campaign involving workers, urban and youth. A group of idealistic youth campaigned early morning today by train hopping for their favored opposition senatorial bets and the partylist group PM.

“It is an uphill fight against the deluge of fake partylist groups, many supported by the administration and all promoting the candidacy of trapos. But the only way to gain representation for the truly marginalized is by fighting and winning,” declared Manny Manato, nominee of PM and chair of the informal settler network Kilos Maralita.

Around 15 student leaders from the PUP Central Student Council and the student party SPEAK leafleted the MRT and LRT train stations at North EDSA, Cubao, Recto and Pureza today as the opening salvo of a youth campaign for principled politics. The youth leaders say that they are campaigning early to jump the gun on trapos who have the money and influence to dominate the election period. 

Yesterday, the same groups crowdsourced from fellow PUP students to finance the printing of the leaflets that they distributed today. Dubbed "Piso mo para sa Pagbabago," they successfully solicited donations for national candidates that they assert embody the advocacy and fight for real social change.

The youth leaders are challenging candidates to support the demand to increase the education share of the national budget to 6%. They believe that the protracted fight over the pork barrel of solons that led to the delayed enactment of the General Appropriations Act is a case of the teapot calling the kettle black. The real issues are greater budget for social services like public education, universal health care, extended maternity and guaranteed public employment for the jobless.

Also today, Partido Manggagawa worker and urban poor leaders are launching their official partylist campaign by going to the grassroots. In Bulacan, urban poor leaders are hopping from one relocation area and depressed community to another across the towns of Marilao to Malolos to propagate the demand for affordable housing for the poor. It was in Pandi, Bulacan where a government housing project was occupied by informal settlers.

Meanwhile, in Cavite, union leaders are going to leaflet fellow workers in the giant Cavite Economic Zone to highlight the call for a national minimum wage and regular jobs for all. The demand for regular jobs, a national minimum wage, affordable housing, increased education budget and other social services are the key planks of the electoral platform of PM partylist. ###

Labor group slams Drew Olivar of “Pepedederalismo” for cyber libel

The labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) today slammed for cyber libel the blogger Drew Olivar who recently hit the news for the controversial “Pepedederalismo” video together with PCOO Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson.

Olivar, in a Facebook post last September 30, 2017 on his “Drew Olivar Blog” accused Ver Estorosas, a PM leader, of absconding after allegedly receiving P8 million to mobilize people for a September 21, 2017 in Luneta. A picture of Estorosas in a rally was maliciously entitled “WANTED” in bold letters in Olivar’s blog post.

“Blabber blogger Drew Olivar is not just an indecent promoter of Pepedederalismo in cahoots with Mocha Uson but is also a thief of images for the profitable production and distribution of fake news. Ver Estorosas, as chairman of the PM Bulacan chapter, is not a fugitive but on the contrary active in leading actions of urban poor for their housing demands and NutriAsia workers for their job security,” stated Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

He added that the group is consulting with lawyers for the appropriate course of action to defend the rights of Estorosas and stop Olivar from peddling libelous posts.

Magtubo insisted that “Olivar’s accusation is an outright lie and a figment of his imagination. He stole the photo from a rally of housing applicants in NHA Bulacan led by PM that was covered by mainstream media such as CNN Philippines and Rappler. PM was not even a participant to the September 21, 2017 rally in Luneta that was called by the Movement Against Tyranny.”

Olivar’s libelous post was brought to the attention of PM by members of the workers association BPO Shield (formerly Inter-Call Center Association of Workers) who dug into Olivar’s account after the “Pepedederalismo” video went viral.

“The Pepedederalismo video is a waste of taxpayers’ money that was squeezed from the people through TRAIN. We vow to mobilize workers and the poor against the charter change campaign of the Duterte administration. The shift to federalism is a scheme to perpetuate Duterte and trapos like Gloria Arroyo in power. The answer to mass poverty and social inequality is system change not charter change. Chicha hindi chacha!,” argued Magtubo.

“We warn Olivar against stealing more photos of rallies for his business of peddling fake news,” Magtubo cautioned as PM today held a mobilization of workers at the Senate in time for the sponsorship speech by Sen. Joel Villanueva of the security of tenure bill.

August 7, 2018

It is the 119 robots in Congress that deserve a P1,000 budget

Robots are non-humans and therefore have no human rights. Congress has 119 of them and a P1,000 budget could be more than enough for their minimal upkeep. Human rights workers are people who deserve to live a life of dignity as well as a safe and sympathetic environment.

 

The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) works for the protection and promotion of human rights. The CHR, according to one of its mandates, should work closely with Congress “to recommend effective measures to promote human rights and to provide for compensation to victims of violations of human rights, or their families.” On the other hand, the function of the members of the House of Representatives (HOR) is to enact law and must uphold the law with highest integrity and standard.

 

The HOR and CHR therefore, as their mandates dictate, must work hand in hand for the protection and promotion of human rights, not the other way around.  Providing the CHR with a PhP1,000 budget based on flimsy reasons and alternative facts can only be described as an act of bigots and dishonourable men, so shameful that a total of 119 robots were successfully assembled by Speaker Alvarez to kill the right of the CHR and its workers to exist. It is a clear case of Congress’ power of the purse being used as a political tool to impose authoritarian rule.

 

This, to us, is the lowest act of the lowest kind of people in Congress who do not understand or who will never understand the universal concept of human rights. We likewise believe that the HOR leadership do not act alone in this respect as they clearly are in line with the President’s outspoken distaste of human rights.

 

Furthermore, this despicable action of Congress against the CHR, NCIP and ERC can also be deemed as anti-labor since most of the agencies’ budgets go to wages and benefits as well as the operations of their personnel. This is tantamount to constructive dismissal or political persecution at worst. In fact, this is an illegal act that warrants court actions.

 

If Congress can happily grant Mocha Uson a P106,454 monthly compensation for spreading fake news and performing live shows in the side lines, why punish human rights workers who are performing their jobs better under any administration?

13 September 2017

EDSA’s epic fail engendering throwback to dictatorship—youth group

Ahead of the anniversary of the people power uprising, a youth group said that the failed promise of EDSA has laid the fertile ground for the revival of authoritarianism and a revision of history. “As working class millennials—community youth and young workers—we are witness to, nay victims of, the disaster of three decades of EDSA democracy,” declared Ryan Bocacao of PM-Kabataan, the youth wing of the militant Partido Manggagawa.

Tomorrow members of PM-Kabataan together with workers from PM are joining a mass at the La Salle Greenhills sponsored by the AMRSP and iDefend, and then later the rally at the People Power Monument. Meanwhile the PM chapter in Cebu is participating in a multisectoral rally at downtown Gaisano Metro tomorrow afternoon.

Both PM and PM-Kabataan expressed apprehension at the suppression of political dissent with the arrest of Sen. Leila de Lima. “Workers defend civil liberties because political freedom is a necessity in fighting for and winning labor demands,” Bocacao explained.

He added that “To those living in the purgatory of the EDSA democracy, the hell of martial law is little comfort. No surprise then that purveyors of fake news, creative imagination and alternative facts are having a field day. EDSA’s epic fail created a vacuum that is being filled by an authoritarian throwback.”

“Poverty, inequality and injustice have persisted and plagued our country since 1986. True these were a pestilence even during the Marcos dictatorship despite recent attempts to prettify the thingy called martial law. The infamous infrastructure projects of Marcos which keeps popping up on social media were no more than just opportunities to rob the people while pushing generations of Filipinos deep into debt. The plunder of the national treasury and the systematic    human rights violations by the state still have no parallel during the post-EDSA regimes. Abuse of power is necessarily worse under a dictatorial regime which does not have to bother with the niceties of due process, civil liberties, press freedom or a political opposition,” the group insisted.

Bocacao averred that “All those political—and social, we should not forget—contradictions during the 14 years of the Marcos dictatorship finally exploded in that historic event called the people power uprising. While the yearning for democracy was central to EDSA, the cause of social justice—the demand of workers for rights, of peasants for land, of students for reform, among others—was no less a key impetus. Yet under the leadership of the Dilawan, to be exact the elite faction opposed to the Marcos dictatorship, the democracy built after EDSA was only a caricature.”

“The EDSA democracy is a skeleton without flesh. The formality is there but the substance is lacking. Elections are a farce. Instead of an exercise in democracy, it is a rigodon for dynasties and warlords. Regime after regime played deaf to the cry for social justice as globalization dictated by the IMF and WTO was embraced. Cheap labor was used as come on for foreign investors. Farmers buckled under the onslaught of cheap imports. Social services suffered as the national budget was decimated by debt outlays, a big part of which was to pay loans taken out by Marcos. With a bleak future in the country, millions of Filipinos migrated despite all the sacrifices and difficulties,” Bocacao stated.

He ended “Is a return to the past the answer to the misery of the present? We say no, as young Filipinos who wish the best for our country. Is it time to move on instead of celebrate EDSA as the Duterte administration say? We say no, for we believe the real alternative is to level up EDSA. People power is hollow without democratizing power. Empowering the people—providing economic security to the masses and also their participation in policy decisions—will pull the rug from underneath historical revisionists and wannabee dictators.”

Partido Manggagawa-Kabataan

February 24, 2017

EDSA’s epic fail engendering throwback to dictatorship

On the 31^st anniversary of the EDSA uprising, it is time to admit the bitter truth that its failed promise has laid the fertile ground for the revival of authoritarianism and a revision of history. As working class millennials—community youth and young workers—we are witness, nay victims, to the disaster of three decades of EDSA democracy.

Poverty, inequality and injustice have persisted and plagued our country since 1986. True these were a pestilence even during the Marcos dictatorship despite recent attempts to prettify the thingy called martial law. The infamous infrastructure projects of Marcos which keeps popping up on social media were no more than just opportunities to rob the people while pushing generations of Filipinos deep into debt. The plunder of the national treasury and the systematic human rights violations by the state still have no parallel during the post-EDSA regimes. Abuse of power is necessarily worse under a dictatorial regime which does not have to bother with the niceties of due process, civil liberties, press freedom or a political opposition.

All those political—and social, we should not forget—contradictions during the 14 years of the Marcos dictatorship finally exploded in that historic event called the “people power uprising.” While the yearning for democracy was central to EDSA, the cause of social justice—the demand of workers for rights, of peasants for land, of students for reform, among others—was no less a key impetus. Yet under the leadership of the Dilawan, to be exact the elite faction opposed to the Marcos dictatorship, the democracy built after EDSA was only a caricature.

The EDSA democracy is a skeleton without flesh. The formality is there but the substance is lacking. Elections are a farce. Instead of an exercise in democracy, it is a rigodon for dynasties and warlords. Regime after regime played deaf to the cry for social justice as globalization dictated by the IMF and WTO was embraced. Cheap labor was used as come on for foreign investors. Farmers buckled under the onslaught of cheap imports. Social services suffered as the national budget was decimated by debt outlays, a big part of which was to pay loans taken out by Marcos. With a bleak future in the country, millions of Filipinos migrated despite all the sacrifices and difficulties.

To those living in the purgatory of the EDSA democracy, the hell of martial law is little comfort. No surprise then that purveyors of fake news, creative imagination and alternative facts are having a field day. EDSA’s epic fail created a vacuum that is being filled by an authoritarian throwback.

Cory Aquino made agrarian reform a centerpiece program but almost three decades hence, Hacienda Luisita remains controversial and the most fertile lands in Negros and Mindanao are still in the hands of capitalist landlords and multinational companies. Since EDSA’s let-down is plain to see, memes of a Marcos golden age look like fact rather than fiction.

Is a return to the past the answer to the misery of the present? We say no, as young Filipinos who wish the best for our country. Is it time to move on instead of celebrate EDSA as the Duterte administration say? We say no, for we believe the real alternative is to level up EDSA.

People power is hollow without democratizing power. Only a decisive resolution to the demands of workers for decent jobs, of farmers to control of land, of the poor for social protection and of the people for national sovereignty will rid the country of the plaque of destitution and inequity. Empowering the people—providing economic security to the masses and also their participation in policy decisions—will pull the rug from underneath historical revisionists and wannabee dictators.

Partido Manggagawa-Kabataan (PMK)

February 24, 2017

“End endo” and “Marcos Hindi Bayani” top workers demands in big rally tomorrow

Several thousand workers are marching in key cities tomorrow to commemorate Bonifacio Day, demand a ban on contractualization and protest the hero’s burial of Marcos. Meanwhile the militant Partido Manggagawa (PM) today slammed the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) for a statement that foreign firms will pull out if contractualization is banned.

“The DTI is just parroting the usual capitalist blackmail when workers make demands that dent their profit. Firms, foreign or local, want contractualization because it is a way to cheapen labor costs by denying them job security and the opportunity to unionize and bargain for better wages and benefits,” argued Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

The nationwide Bonifacio Day rallies by the labor coalition Nagkaisa are billed as a “National Day of Action Vs. Endo.” PM together with other labor groups are rejecting the so-called “win-win” solution on contractualization and pushing for “end endo” formula of prohibition of subcontracting of regular jobs.

“The misnamed win-win scheme of the employers and DTI will not end endo. It is a scam that will lead to the utter proliferation of outsourcing and contracting out of regular jobs by the principal employers,” explained Magtubo.

Member groups of Nagkaisa will assemble tomorrow 8:00 a.m. at the Welcome Rotonda and then march to Morayta where it will hold a program. Militant workers will then join advocacy groups for another rally around noon at Mendiola to register labor’s condemnation of the surprise hero’s burial for Marcos.

To express labor’s twin demands tomorrow, PM is highlighting the slogan “Ilibing ang kontraktwalisasyon hindi ang kasalanan ni Marcos.” Magtubo averred that “Students have already made their stand known. Tomorrow workers will voice out their position on the burning issues of our country.”

PM and Nagkaisa are also holding mobilizations in key cities tomorrow. In Cebu City, workers will march from downtown Colon to Plaza Independencia. Industrial and sugar workers are going to rally at the Bacolod marker Araneta. In Davao City tomorrow, workers are marching from the Freedom Park to the Bonifacio Monument.

PM also expressed doubt on the announcement the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) that 25,000 contractual workers have been made regular. Instead PM revealed that the DOLE has not been able to enforce regularization of workers in numerous instances. The militant group said that there is a Japanese-owned electronics factory in the Cavite ecozone that has refused to regularize hundreds of its agency workers despite an order from the DOLE. It cited the case of the PALEA 600 who have not been reinstated by Philippine Airlines as regular workers despite a settlement agreement that provides for it. Finally PM also pointed out the case of 149 Pizza Hut contractual workers who were retrenched when they sought regularization but have been reinstated only as agency workers. “It seems that the news of 25,000 newly regularized workers is fake similar to posts in Mocha Uson's controversial blog,” Magtubo said.

November 29, 2015

Workers doubt DOLE claim of new regulars

The labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) expressed doubt on the announcement of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) that 25,000 contractuals have been regularized. DOLE Secretary Silvestre Bello made the claim in a press conference in Malacanang.

“As much as we welcome thousands upon thousands of endo workers becoming regular employees, we are skeptical of DOLE’s claim because our own experience is that employers are extremely resistant to regularization,” declared Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

Meanwhile PM, together with other groups like the Philippine Airlines union PALEA and the labor center SENTRO, today held a rally at the DOLE main office to push for an “end endo” formula of regulation and prohibition of subcontracting of regular jobs. The protest today is a buildup for the big nationwide mobilization by workers on November 30 to highlight the call to stop all forms of contractualization, including outsourcing.

Magtubo added that “We know for a fact that the DOLE has not been able to enforce regularization of workers in numerous instances. To cite a few examples. One is a Japanese-owned electronics factory in the Cavite ecozone that has refused to regularize hundreds of its agency workers despite an order from the DOLE. Second is the PALEA 600 who have not been reinstated by Philippine Airlines as regular workers despite a settlement agreement that provides for it. Finally the case of 149 Pizza Hut contractual workers who were retrenched when they sought regularization but have been reinstated only as agency workers.”

“The contagion of contractualization is spreading instead of being contained. In Toledo City in Cebu province, a large mining company is laying off workers who will then be hired as contractuals in agencies to do the same work. So we ask DOLE: Show us the 25,000 new regulars!,” Magtubo averred.

He quipped that “It seems that the news of 25,000 newly regularized workers is fake similar to posts in Mocha Uson's controversial blog,” he insisted.

Magtubo also slammed Bello’s endorsement of the employers’ “win-win” formula on contractualization. “The so-called win-win formula of the employers and now the DOLE will not end endo. The ‘win-win’ scheme is a scam that will lead to the utter proliferation of outsourcing and contracting out of regular jobs in the principal employers. The Labor Secretary is turning his back on the participants to the three Labor Summits convened by the DOLE in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao who resolved to end all forms of contractualization,” insisted Magtubo.

November 24, 2015

DOLE’s win-win will not end endo—labor group

The militant labor party Partido Manggagawa (PM) slammed Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello’s endorsement of the employers’ “win-win” formula on contractualization. In a press conference yesterday, Bello claimed regularizing workers in the agencies will deliver the administration’s promise to end contractualization.

“The so-called win-win formula of the employers and now the DOLE will not end endo. It is a blatant betrayal of the campaign promise of then-candidate Rodrigo Duterte to eradicate contractualization. The ‘win-win’ scheme is a scam that will lead to the utter proliferation of outsourcing and contracting out of regular jobs in the principal employers,” declared Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

PM announced that they will hold a rally tomorrow at the DOLE main office to protest Bello’s endorsement of the “win-win” scheme and to push for an “end endo” formula of regulation and prohibition of subcontracting of regular jobs. Also PM, the Nagkaisa labor coalition and workers groups are gearing for a big mobilization on November 30 to highlight the call to stop all forms of contractualization, including outsourcing.

The group also expressed doubt on Bello’s statement that 25,000 contractual workers have been made regular. Instead PM revealed that the DOLE has not been able to enforce regularization of workers in numerous instances. The militant group said that there is a Japanese-owned electronics factory in the Cavite ecozone that has refused to regularize hundreds of its agency workers despite an order from the DOLE. It cited the case of the PALEA 600 who have not been reinstated by Philippine Airlines as regular workers despite a settlement agreement that provides for it. Finally PM also pointed out the case of 149 Pizza Hut contractual workers who were retrenched when they sought regularization but have been reinstated only as agency workers.

Magtubo said “It seems that the news of 25,000 newly regularized workers is fake similar to posts in Mocha Uson's controversial blog.”

He insisted that Secretary Bello is revising the promise of Pres. Duterte by arguing that the latter’s marching order is only to end “illegal contractualization.” Magtubo also countered that the Bello his turning back on the participants to the three Labor Summits convened by the DOLE in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao who resolved to end all forms of contractualization.

November 23, 2016