Ahead of SONA, labor group slams factory closures at Mactan Export Processing Zone

The labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) slammed the retrenchment of some 4,100 workers at Mactan Apparel Inc. and its satellite companies. “These are factory closures, not just mass layoffs. Even though the economy is growing, workers are suffering. More than 4,000 breadwinners have lost their jobs and their families will now have to deal with all the difficulties of joblessness,” declared Dennis Derige, spokesperson of the Cebu chapter of PM.

 

He added that “With President Bong Bong Marcos Jr. due to give his State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Monday, we demand of him: Trabaho at bigas sa Bagong Pilipinas! Kung walang trabahong regular and walang murang bigas, bigo ang Pilipinas sa iyong pamumuno.”

 

PM stated that the call for job security, wage hike and cheap prices are among their calls for the counter-SONA protest on Monday. A petition for a P100 minimum wage hike has been filed in Cebu and Bohol. The wage boards have set hearings on the P100 petition on July 26 in Metro Cebu and August 10 in Bohol.

 

Different labor groups are mobilizing hundreds of workers, students and urban poor for the counter-SONA. PM, along with groups SENTRO and Akbayan, will assemble in Plaza Independencia at 8:00 am on July 24. Then they will march onto the Cebu City Freedom Park and finally merge with other organizations for the main program in Metro Colon.

 

Mactan Apparel Inc. and its sister companies, MAI Printing and FIT printing are closing down. The three factories make sportswear exclusively for the global brand Adidas and is part of the Sports City conglomerate, which is the biggest employer in the Mactan Export Processing Zone. The retrenchment at Mactan Apparel is the third wave of mass layoffs at Sports City. Some 4,000 workers were laid off across the different Sports City garment factories in September 2022 and another 4,000 in September 2020 at the height of the pandemic.

 

“We call on global brand Adidas to explain why their supplier factories are closing down. Adidas should step up, be transparent and clarify to workers who made their sportswear why they are losing their jobs. Do not make the usual alibi for not doing anything that your supplier is complying with the minimum standards set by law. If Adidas is indeed a good corporate citizen, then it must exercise responsibility for the loss of livelihood of 4,000 workers,” insisted Derige.

 

PM also argued that the series of mass layoffs and factory closures at MEPZ exposed the vulnerability of a development model founded on foreign investment and export production. “We need a paradigm shift away from export orientation. Economic and social development should be founded on a planned industrial policy that prioritizes domestic production even as it takes advantage of export markets,” Derige explained.

Press Release

July 20, 2023

Labor groups alarmed at MEPZ mass layoff

 

Labor groups Partido Manggagawa (PM) and Sentro ng mga Nagkakaisa at Progresibong Manggagawa (SENTRO) expressed their concern at the retrenchment of some 4,000 workers across five factories of the Sports City group of companies.

 

“This is alarming for workers in Cebu and elsewhere. For the biggest MEPZ employer to retrench 1/4 of of its workers may be a portent of worse things to come. What is the response of the government? Don't tell us ‘unity’,” exclaimed Dennis Derige, PM-Cebu spokesperson.

 

Workers of garment firms Mactan Apparels, Inc.; Metro Wear, Inc.; Globalwear Manufacturing, Inc.; Feeder Apparel Corporation; and Vertex One Apparel Phils. Inc.—all owned by Sports City—were affected in the largest termination yet this year. Sports City is the biggest employer in the Mactan Economic Zone and supplies to global garment brands.

 

Both PM and SENTRO said that they will further investigate the claims of Sports City about the “sudden dropping and reduction of orders from our clients.” “We cannot take these claims at face value. In fact, factories traditionally increase their production in the ber months to meet the huge spike in demand during the holiday season. We will seek help from our allies abroad to check the veracity of these claims of diminished orders,” Derige insisted.

Sports City supplies apparel to global brands Adidas, Under Armour, Saucony, New Balance and Lululemon. 

 

He said that workers were caught off guard by the mass layoff. He explained that “There was no social dialogue between the employer and the employees. A better option is that negotiations transpire between employer and employee representatives so that workers have voice and participation in the basis and terms of the termination.”

 

Last year, unions were formed at Mactan Apparel, Metro Wear and Globalwear but were defeated in the certification election. PM had slammed the companies for delaying the elections for almost half a year even as an anti-union campaign was conducted using social media.

 

In the face of the mass layoff at the MEPZ and other companies, PM and SENTRO also called on the government to heed the demand for employment guarantees. The proposal of the labor coalition Nagkaisa calls for public employment, preferably in climate jobs, for unemployed workers over a period of 100 days to nine months at minimum wages or P10,000, whichever is higher. In response to this demand, the Department of Labor and Employment undertook a study of a social protection floor which has remained unimplemented.

 

“It is high time that the employment guarantee and other social protection mechanisms are enacted,” Derige ended

September 30, 2022

Labor standards violations at garment export firm

FCO is a garments manufacturer in the Cebu Economic Zone that supplies to brands Victoria's Secret, Champion and Black/Pink. The company retrenched more than a hundred workers last September without paying separation benefits due them according to law. Aside from this, FCO also did not grant holiday pay to its workers. The firm likewise hires workers on short-term contracts then rehires them on new ones to avoid the regularization of its employees. All of these are in violation of Philippine labor laws or regulations.