We congratulate the All Pakistan Trade Union Federation (APTUF) for the successful convening of its National Congress. The Partido ng Manggagawa (Labor Party-Philippines) wishes you all the success and strength in carrying out your struggle for peace, democracy and social justice.
The global capitalist crisis, exacerbated by the global financial crisis that exploded in 2008, has brought enormous burden to the world's working people. While it is true that the deepening capitalist crisis brings with it the prospect of its imminent collapse and therefore the possibility of a system change, the process of building a strong working class movement may require new tactics and perhaps new organizational forms and struggles.This is because the capitalist crisis has also gave rise to de-industrialization which created sections of the working class outside of the formal economy.
In the Philippines, for instance, 70% of our labor force live on precarious conditions and remain unprotected as they are not employed in the formal economy. As in your case, child labor, contractual work arrangements, and worst, the existence of unpaid labor are prevalent in the Philippines.
On the other hand, the global crisis is also taking its heavy toll on workers in industries as corporations resort to downsizing, outsourcing and many forms of contractualization. In fact, we are now in the middle of an intense struggle against the policy of mass layoff and contractualization in the Philippine Airlines as well as in other big companies in the Philippines.
The capitalist crisis, no doubt, has denied the present and the next generation of workers opportunities to have decent jobs and better living conditions. We also live in a hostile environment where senseless wars and violence occur in many parts of the world. Pakistan, we are aware, has become an unwilling victim of America's "war on terror" brought into the "second front." These wars has even become more arbitrary and unilateral as superpowers move without the sanctions of international bodies.
What we have now, inded, is a period of acute capitalist crisis with wars and heigthening exploitation showing their ugly heads. The world's working class is thus faced with the challenge of building a force capable of reversing this historical course. This is the task only the working class can do.
Brothers and sisters, let us not allow this crisis lead the world toward barbarism. The Filipino working class will always be one with you and the world's working people in the struggle for peace, democracy and social justice.
Mabuhay! Long live!
In Solidarity,
Renato Magtubo
Chairperson
Partido ng Manggagawa (Labor Party-Philippines)
Showing posts with label global crisis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label global crisis. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Women workers support RH bill
PRESS STATEMENT
1 December 2010
Working women add our voice to the chorus of support for the RH bill. The Partido ng Manggagawa asserts that the passage of House Bill 96 or “The Reproductive Health and Population and Development Act of 2010” is critical given the impact of the global financial crisis on working people and the poor, especially women. The growing incidence of hunger and poverty only connotes that poor and working women will neither be able to afford nor access contraceptive methods, in particular, and reproductive health care services, in general.
PM supports the RH bill on the basis of women’s right to reproductive health care. The rapid increase in population due to unmet needs of married Filipino women for family planning services is a growing concern. It is different when population control is forced rather than the implicit demand of women as reflected in the following statistics:
• Women want fewer children than they actually have. The total wanted fertility in the country of 2.4 children is 27% lower than the actual total fertility rate of 3.3 children (NDHS 2008)
• 42% of women consider a two-child family as the ideal family size (2008 NDHS)
• 2.6 million Filipino women would like to plan their families but lack information and access to do so. (Family Planning Survey 2006)
• Among the poorest women who would like to avoid pregnancy, at least 41% do not use any contraceptive method because of lack of information or access. (FPS 2006)
• 22% of married Filipino women have an unmet need for family planning services (2008 National Demographic and Health Survey), an increase of more than one-third since the 2003 NDHS, among other numerous statistics and studies that have been conducted.
These data, including the fact that from the 1999 population of roughly 75 million, 10 years later after the first comprehensive version of the RH bill was filed in Congress, the country’s population has increased by 19.3 million or an annual average increase of two million every year within the decade.
And more importantly, precise and regular use of contraceptives can decrease abortion rates by as much as 85% according to Allan Guttmacher Institute. As to the Catholic Church’s irresponsible statement that modern contraception is a form of abortion, this distorts the scientific fact that pregnancy happens at implantation and not during conception as it boldly claims. Such unscientific assertion belies the Church’s claim of being not anti-scientific; it is rather relative, depending on whether it would adhere to its archaic views, regardless of it being anti-women.
This is like going back to the four centuries-old controversy (wherein the Church believed that it is the Earth rather than the Sun the is the center of the solar system) that led to thee burning of Giordano Bruno alive at the stake and the trial of Galileo Galilei by the Inquisition and which forced him to recant and spend the rest of his life under house arrest. And to which, 1992, Pope John Paul II acknowledged a mistake. PM hopes that it will not take that long for the Church to admit that it is making the same mistake.
1 December 2010
Working women add our voice to the chorus of support for the RH bill. The Partido ng Manggagawa asserts that the passage of House Bill 96 or “The Reproductive Health and Population and Development Act of 2010” is critical given the impact of the global financial crisis on working people and the poor, especially women. The growing incidence of hunger and poverty only connotes that poor and working women will neither be able to afford nor access contraceptive methods, in particular, and reproductive health care services, in general.
PM supports the RH bill on the basis of women’s right to reproductive health care. The rapid increase in population due to unmet needs of married Filipino women for family planning services is a growing concern. It is different when population control is forced rather than the implicit demand of women as reflected in the following statistics:
• Women want fewer children than they actually have. The total wanted fertility in the country of 2.4 children is 27% lower than the actual total fertility rate of 3.3 children (NDHS 2008)
• 42% of women consider a two-child family as the ideal family size (2008 NDHS)
• 2.6 million Filipino women would like to plan their families but lack information and access to do so. (Family Planning Survey 2006)
• Among the poorest women who would like to avoid pregnancy, at least 41% do not use any contraceptive method because of lack of information or access. (FPS 2006)
• 22% of married Filipino women have an unmet need for family planning services (2008 National Demographic and Health Survey), an increase of more than one-third since the 2003 NDHS, among other numerous statistics and studies that have been conducted.
These data, including the fact that from the 1999 population of roughly 75 million, 10 years later after the first comprehensive version of the RH bill was filed in Congress, the country’s population has increased by 19.3 million or an annual average increase of two million every year within the decade.
And more importantly, precise and regular use of contraceptives can decrease abortion rates by as much as 85% according to Allan Guttmacher Institute. As to the Catholic Church’s irresponsible statement that modern contraception is a form of abortion, this distorts the scientific fact that pregnancy happens at implantation and not during conception as it boldly claims. Such unscientific assertion belies the Church’s claim of being not anti-scientific; it is rather relative, depending on whether it would adhere to its archaic views, regardless of it being anti-women.
This is like going back to the four centuries-old controversy (wherein the Church believed that it is the Earth rather than the Sun the is the center of the solar system) that led to thee burning of Giordano Bruno alive at the stake and the trial of Galileo Galilei by the Inquisition and which forced him to recant and spend the rest of his life under house arrest. And to which, 1992, Pope John Paul II acknowledged a mistake. PM hopes that it will not take that long for the Church to admit that it is making the same mistake.
Friday, November 12, 2010
PALEA returns to Mendiola, appeals to P-Noy in last-minute bid to stop layoff
Press Release
November 12, 2010
PALEA
The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA) today returned to Mendiola for a rally to appeal to President Benigno Aquino III to stop the mass layoff of 2,600 employees at Philippine Airlines (PAL). PALEA submitted a formal petition to the Office of the President appealing for presidential intervention to suspend the implementation of the Baldoz decision pending its review.
“We are hopeful that P-Noy will act immediately on our petition. The President has the power based on Article 263(g) of the Labor Code to intervene at any time and assume jurisdiction over any labor dispute in order to settle it. That power has usually been used to stop workers from holding a strike as in the case of PALEA and FASAP recently. But now we are challenging P-Noy to employ it to stop management’s planned mass layoff,” explained Gerry Rivera, PALEA president and PM vice chairperson.
Some 300 PALEA members and supporters from Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) and the coalition Kontra launched a motorcade that started at the PNB Building in Diosdado Macapagal Blvd. then went onto to the Department of Labor and Employment and ended at Mendiola by noon. Meanwhile PALEA, PM and Kontra members in the cities of Cebu and Davao picketed the local Department of Labor and Employment offices to lambast the controversial Baldoz decision.
PALEA had initially planned to file a case at the Court of Appeals to question the Baldoz ruling. Rivera asserted that “We are still reserving the option to go to the Court of Appeals if nothing happens with the Office of the President. We believe we have 60 days to file a case at the Court of Appeals.”
PALEA insisted that its notice of strike is based on valid grounds of unfair labor practice by PAL. “Cielo Villaluna of PAL keeps on denying our claim that management is trying to convince union members to accept the termination package. But she signed the minutes of the conciliation meeting last Monday which states that ‘Management, through counsel, will talk to the managers to refrain from discussing the plan/issues with union members.” PAL has practically admitted to our allegation,” argued Rivera.
He also added in response to Baldoz’ justification that outsourcing is a global trend, “It does not mean that if others are doing it then it is right. If that is the logic then Filipino workers should then be enjoying the generous benefits and protection accorded workers abroad. Fact is the worldwide shift to outsourcing and contractualization has lead to the worsening of global poverty. This global inequality is the root of the global crisis two years ago which is a problem of overproduction in goods due to the lack of purchasing power by workers whose wages and benefits have shrank in the last two decades.”
November 12, 2010
PALEA
The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA) today returned to Mendiola for a rally to appeal to President Benigno Aquino III to stop the mass layoff of 2,600 employees at Philippine Airlines (PAL). PALEA submitted a formal petition to the Office of the President appealing for presidential intervention to suspend the implementation of the Baldoz decision pending its review.
“We are hopeful that P-Noy will act immediately on our petition. The President has the power based on Article 263(g) of the Labor Code to intervene at any time and assume jurisdiction over any labor dispute in order to settle it. That power has usually been used to stop workers from holding a strike as in the case of PALEA and FASAP recently. But now we are challenging P-Noy to employ it to stop management’s planned mass layoff,” explained Gerry Rivera, PALEA president and PM vice chairperson.
Some 300 PALEA members and supporters from Partido ng Manggagawa (PM) and the coalition Kontra launched a motorcade that started at the PNB Building in Diosdado Macapagal Blvd. then went onto to the Department of Labor and Employment and ended at Mendiola by noon. Meanwhile PALEA, PM and Kontra members in the cities of Cebu and Davao picketed the local Department of Labor and Employment offices to lambast the controversial Baldoz decision.
PALEA had initially planned to file a case at the Court of Appeals to question the Baldoz ruling. Rivera asserted that “We are still reserving the option to go to the Court of Appeals if nothing happens with the Office of the President. We believe we have 60 days to file a case at the Court of Appeals.”
PALEA insisted that its notice of strike is based on valid grounds of unfair labor practice by PAL. “Cielo Villaluna of PAL keeps on denying our claim that management is trying to convince union members to accept the termination package. But she signed the minutes of the conciliation meeting last Monday which states that ‘Management, through counsel, will talk to the managers to refrain from discussing the plan/issues with union members.” PAL has practically admitted to our allegation,” argued Rivera.
He also added in response to Baldoz’ justification that outsourcing is a global trend, “It does not mean that if others are doing it then it is right. If that is the logic then Filipino workers should then be enjoying the generous benefits and protection accorded workers abroad. Fact is the worldwide shift to outsourcing and contractualization has lead to the worsening of global poverty. This global inequality is the root of the global crisis two years ago which is a problem of overproduction in goods due to the lack of purchasing power by workers whose wages and benefits have shrank in the last two decades.”
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