World Peace Bell, Quezon Memorial Circle

Quezon City, Philippines

The contending states claiming territorial jurisdiction over sections of the ‘Southeast Asian Sea’ are only heightening regional tensions to a frightening degree. In particular, the contentious row between the Philippines and China is being amplified by certain quarters to a near-conflict level for seemingly nationalistic, but in fact chauvinistic reasons. And as the almost daily sounds of fury raise the stakes for the region’s masses of humanity, many more sober voices of concern must now come out to be heard and not be silenced by the saber-rattling of a deluded few.

Southeast Asia’s regional security environment faces a clear and present danger. The Manila-Beijing standoff emanating from their rival claims to the Southeast Asian Sea must urgently be turned around and be resolved through a process of open diplomacy between the two nations. Both sides need to do so swiftly in order to avert a possible scenario of military confrontation affecting the wider Asia-Pacific region. If this happens, it would only cause a massive blow to the Philippines—its peoples, the economy and society at large.

Undoubtedly, today’s international situation is highly fluid and volatile. The global capitalist system remains dominated by an elite few and its economic and political control over the world’s social majority is primarily upheld by a corporate-driven and profit-oriented neoliberal paradigm. But ever since last year’s worldwide mass upsurges of the global poor, the 99% was able to directly challenge the exploitative and oppressive rule of the 1% across many regions of the world. Yet still, the world continues to dangerously swing from one economic crisis to another, from one toppled regime to the next, and from one war of aggression to yet one more.

And here in the Philippines, the PNoy regime is now seemingly driving our country into a potential state of war with China. Malacañang’s over-reactive pro-US imperialist foreign policy stance is needlessly provoking Beijing into taking a more belligerent attitude towards Manila. Instead of initiating and pursuing a long-range strategic foreign policy thrust premised on the universally acknowledged internationalist principles of sovereign independence, humanist solidarity, people-centered development and progressive self-determination, the PNoy regime is merely maintaining a century-old dependency track in managing our external relations.

At the same time, China must also be firmly admonished for its increasing militarization and power-bullying of other regional claimants in the Southeast Asian Sea. Beijing must realize that the only long-term comprehensive resolution to the regional crisis is through a regionalized multilateral approach which does not have to involve the world’s chief imperialist power, the United States. If China adheres to regional cooperation, it can reap more respect and friendly allies from around its neighborhood without having to impose its powerful might to justify its ends.

In the meantime, the United States is now re-positioning and enhancing its forward power-projection capabilities around the broader Asian region with its aggressive foreign policy framework of an ‘Asian Pivot’. This explains why Washington continues to remain actively involved within the ASEAN Regional Forum’s (ARF) political-security dialogue process, which also includes China and all the ASEAN member-states. Yet given this context, a parallel regional dialogue mechanism which only involves the ASEAN, China, plus other interested and concerned Asian states, can already be initiated and set up to specifically concentrate on resolving the Southeast Asian Sea dilemma without Washington’s undue influence, as is the case with the ARF approach.

Nevertheless, the collective voices and actions of the many all around the world have already been able to progressively change and radically alter the course of the early 21st century. The masses in many parts of the world, such as in Latin America and the Middle East, are now marching toward a more consciously self-determined history to further liberate humanity from imposed wars of aggression and systemic misery. It is this same fundamental spirit that should greatly guide all the peoples living within and around the Southeast Asian region, including its large neighbor China, to always and consistently strive for genuine peace and freedom for the larger regional community of states and societies. This we must do if we all are to principally advance and eventually establish our common vision of a regionalist community within a truly internationalist world order.

Therefore, it is for this principled reason that we are all gathered today to stand together as one united voice concerned for our region’s peace and progress. We are now collectively and loudly voicing out our immediate and urgent concerns about the presently tense and unstable regional security situation and for it to be directly resolved through a transparent mode of diplomacy. To reiterate, we do not want any open military confrontation to break out between China and the Philippines in relation to the Southeast Asian Sea problem. And we certainly do not want the US to intervene in any way because its priority strategic agenda will never be in favor of Manila or the Asian region as a whole, but always in line with Washington’s global hegemonic schemes for world capitalist domination. We also believe that the claims to the contested Southeast Asian Sea can be equitably resolved through open diplomacies of all governments concerned, under the framework of regional cooperation and sharing, than through gunboat diplomacy or open war, where only the powerful nations stand to gain.

Finally, as we all add our voices of concern to this regional problem, we must remain open-minded and critically discerning of the constantly changing conditions that led us to this situation in the first place. We must always pursue a collective regional approach that fosters peace and cooperation. We must not allow ourselves to be used as a ‘provocation agent-state’ for or against another neighboring state, lest we really aim to ignite a broad Asia-Pacific war with horrendous consequences.

Thus, we raise our voices today to say that this is what we shall never allow to happen. Standing united as a broad progressive front, we shall exert all possible efforts to oppose and stop any future conflict or war from breaking out as a result of misplaced national-chauvinist reactions from both sides to this impasse. We must not wait for tomorrow to pass. Let us all act today to block the road to a potential regional war fanned by heated passions over rocks and shoals. Let us now mobilize and support all moves for transparent diplomacy in combination with mass pressure from below and across the region. ###

Signed by:

Alliance of Progressive Labor

AWARDEE, Inc.

DAMMMBA

Kilusan Para sa Pambansang Demokrasya

Liga Manggagawa

MAKABAYAN

Pagkakaisa ng Kababaihan para sa Kalayaan KAISAKA

Partido Manggagawa

Partido Lakas ng Masa

Peace Women Partners

Philippine Women Network for Peace and Security

SANLAKAS

SCRAP VFA Movement

Socialista Women

WomanHealth

Women’s Education, Devt., Productivity & Research Organization,Inc. WEDPRO

Young Moro Professionals Network

Youth for Nationalism and Democracy

Stop the War Coalition Philippines

(more individual and organization signatories still being confirmed.

To be added later)

In what should have been a momentous event, leaders of the armed forces and the police, as well as the labor (DOLE), defense (DND) and interior and local government (DILG) departments, will sign today the guidelines on the conduct of the said agencies on ensuring that workers’ rights will not be curtailed.

The guidelines are merely reiterations of many existing laws and policies, but what made this document valuable is that it allows workers and trade unions another instrument to help compel the military and the police – amid their alleged involvement in rampant human and workers’ rights violations – to obey the laws that promote and defend workers’ rights, the League of Independent Bank Organizations (LIBO), an alliance of different unions in the banking industry, grudgingly admitted.

“The guidelines look good in paper, but we doubt if the AFP and PNP are truly committed to uphold our rights as workers and trade unionists,” Ricky Ballesteros, LIBO president, retorted.

“In fact, our fellow unionists in the AFPSLAI (Armed Forces and Police Savings and Loan Association) bank were victims of injustice perpetrated by military and police officers in active service and those that have already retired but whose influence and connection with the bank remain strong,” Mr. Ballesteros reported.

The LIBO president is referring to the protracted labor dispute in AFPSLAI, in which last year 15 union officers were dismissed by the AFPSLAI management for allegedly staging an illegal strike in 2009 during the deadlock in their collective bargaining negotiation.

LIBO said that any lawyer would agree that lunch-time picket done by the AFPSLAI union was not illegal and actually a constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression, and because it did not cause disruption in the normal operation of the company, the protest action could never be classified as a strike.

The “illegal strike” case is still pending in the Court of Appeals but the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) has earlier decided, last January 31 and March 7, that AFPSLAI was guilty of illegal dismissal and ordered for the immediate return to work of the officers of the AFPSLAI Employees Association (AEA).

Thus, LIBO explained, even if there is a pending case in the appellate court, the AFPSLAI management is obliged to readmit the illegally dismissed workers.

“Unfortunately, in utter disrespect to the NLRC’s ruling, the AFPSLAI management still refuses to readmit all the officers and disallows them to function as union officers,” Ballesteros said.

“How can we trust the AFP to sincerely implement the said guidelines when they remain callous to the rights of workers right inside Camp Aguinaldo and other AFP and police camps nationwide, and when they cannot even discipline their fellow soldiers,” Ballesteros added.

The AFPSLAI’s head office is inside Camp Aguinaldo, the AFP headquarters, and has branches located in various military and PNP camps nationwide.

LIBO vows to fully support the struggle of their fellow bank unionists in AEA and together with the Sentro ng Progresibong Manggagawa (SENTRO) will continue to hold the AFP leadership as responsible for the continuing violations of workers and trade union rights in AFPSLAI.

NAGKAISA described the ongoing Asian Development Bank conference in PICC, Manila as the final nail on the coffin in which to bury consumers’ protection and workers rights, as Aquino uses the affair as a stage to accelerate the transfer ownership of all remaining power, healthcare and local water assets of the Philippine government to private investors.

Workers belonging to different groups within the coalition waved banners and placards as they attempted to deliver their own messages while Aquino was making his speech before hundreds of foreign delegates.

NAGKAISA linked the ADB privatization agenda and the Administration’s flagship Public Private Partnership to Aquino’s May 1 Labor Day speech, where he practically told workers petitioning for better workers protection, by supporting their security of tenure bill, to drop dead.

He also essentially discredited the pending congressional wage increase proposal by erroneous computation during a Labor Day dialogue that never was.

Aquino even cited cheaper labor in Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand, without comparing the cost of living in those countries with that of the Philippines.

NAGKAISA said that Aquino clearly doesn’t see that increasing the purchasing power of workers thru wage adjustments as a way of raising consumption, as a means of pump priming the economy. Aquino in effect supports a race-to-the-bottom in the name of building Philippine competitiveness by artificially keeping workers salaries’ low.

NAGKAISA likewise noted that during the power summit in Mindanao last month, Aquino had told the audience that they will now have to pay higher power rates from coal and oil plants, and that the government-owned 850mw Agus-Pulangi plants would be privatized.

He seemed to have ignored the warning of local government officials in Mindanao that selling these assets would the electricity industry cartel to invade and cause dramatic increases in rates in the island.

NAGKAISA called on workers and consumers to resist the Aquino government’s initiatives to privatize the healthcare and local water districts in the country. Like the failed privatization of the National Power Corporation in 2001, which was supported by ADB with a $300 million loan, these efforts would not truly benefit the people.

NAGKAISA denounced the failure of the ADB to fulfill its anti-poverty mandate and reason for continued existence.

NAGKAISA reiterated its demand for security of tenure and decent jobs as the best anti-poverty measure and urged the President to favorably act on the workers’ need for increased wages.

At least 5,000 affiliates of the Sentro ng mga Progresibong Manggagawa (Sentro), a newly organized labor center, joined a more massive march and rally in Manila of the recently launched Nagkaisa! labor coalition.

From five converging places along España Blvd., about 20,000 Nagkaisa! members linked up and marched towards Mendiola, near the Malacañang Palace, for an unprecedented unity calling for an end to rampant contractualization, enactment of the Security of Tenure bill in the Congress, across-the-board wage hike, among others.

Similar Sentro and Nagkaisa! mobilizations were simultaneously held in main cities or provinces nationwide, including Lipa, Pampanga, Baguio, Legaspi, Cebu, Iloilo, Davao, Cagayan de Oro, General Santos, and Cotobato.

“Labor unity, however elusive is not totally impossible; but it must be actively pursued and nurtured because a fragmented and weak labor movement can never effectively defend and advance the interests of the workers and the masses, especially at this time of relentless global attacks from the neoliberal clique,” Frank Mero, SENTRO spokesperson said.

“The ‘Labor Unity March’ is a signal that the majority of the mainstream trade unions and other workers’ organizations are ready to take on the policies issues that have been ignored by governments for a long time,” Mero said.

Both SENTRO and NAGKAISA are calling on the Aquino government to: address the worsening precarious work in the country and certify as urgent the passage of security of tenure bill for the private sector (HB 4853) and for the public sector (SB 2875) that is now pending in Congress; support the workers’ demand for across the board wage increases for both the public and private sectors; address the failures of market-oriented policies in public utilities by scraping the EPIRA law and the Oil Deregulation law; prevent the violent demolitions of informal settlers by issuing an Executive Order that would stop the demolition of informal settlers and fast track the development of decent and adequate housing for the poor; provide solid guarantees for workers’ right to self-organization; and, protect and generate secure and decent jobs for all.

Launched only on April 12, Sentro is a national labor center composed of unions and federations in different industries and their subsectors – metal, including automotive, hotel and hospitality, postal, banking, broadcast media, food and beverages, seafaring – as well as the public sector and sectoral groupings of informal sector and urban poor, women, and youth.

Sentro is a member of the broad labor coalition aptly named Nagkaisa! (or united) that was also established last month and comprised by about 40 major trade unions and federations in the country.

Described as an issue-based, multiform and multi-ideological labor alliance, Nagkaisa! is nonetheless a breakthrough in the Philippine labor front as the last time a comparable coalition existed was in 1989 – the Labor Alliance for Wage Increase of P35 (Lawin 35).

The Sentro affiliates are the Alliance of Progressive Labor (APL), APL-Youth, Federation of Coca-Cola Unions (FCCU), Kapisanan ng Maralitang Obrero (KAMAO), League of Independent Bank Organizations (LIBO), MARINO seafarers’ group, National Alliance of Broadcast Unions (NABU), National Confederation of Transportworkers’ Unions (NCTU), National Union of Workers in Hotel, Restaurant and Allied Industries (NUWHRAIN), Philippine Independent Public Sector Employees Association (PIPSEA), Philippine Metalworkers’ Alliance (PMA), Pinag-isang Tinig at Lakas ng Anakpawis (PIGLAS), Postal Employees Union of the Philippines (PEUP), and Workers’ Solidarity Network (WSN).

On the other hand, the roster of the Nagkaisa! include the Alliance of Filipino Workers (AFW), affiliates of the Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP), members of SENTRO, Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP), Confederation of Independent Unions in the Public Sector (CIU), Federation of Free Workers (FFW), Manggagawa para sa Kalayaan ng Bayan (MAKABAYAN), National Federation of Labor Unions (NAFLU), National Mines and Allied Workers’ Union (NAMAWU), National Confederation of Labor (NCL), Philippine Airlines Employees Association (PALEA), Philippine Government Employees Association (PGEA), Partido ng Manggagawa (PM), Public Services Labor Independent Confederation (PSLINK), Philippine Transport and General Workers Organization (PTGWO), Technical Education and Skills Development Authority-Association of Concerned Employees (TESDA-ACE).

“The violence, the injuries of scores of people and the death of a resident can all be blamed on the ineptitude and the insensitivity of the Parañaque local government and the police forces who are supposed to keep the peace,” Fatima Cabanag, KAMAO Secretary General said.

“For ignoring our long standing demand for the issuance of an executive order calling for a moratorium on demolition, the president, Noynoy Aquino, should also be held responsible for this despicable act,” Cabanag added.

Even as they condemned the local government and the police, KAMAO calls for an impartial investigation to ensure that those who are responsible are exposed and held to account for their crimes.

“We stand by the informal settlers. They are well within their rights to defend their homes and fight for a decent and adequate housing,” Cabanag said. The right to housing is recognized by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to which the country is a signatory.

“A mere court order could not legitimize an immoral and illegal act – the demolition of informal settlers’ houses without adequate relocation,” Cabanag said. The Urban Development Housing Act of 1992 explicitly states that, there should be no demolition without relocation.

“Informal settlers are the victims of the government’s inability to live up to its responsibility to provide socialized housing. So why blame the informal settlers?” Cabanag emphatically said.

Cabanag explained that for more than a decade, local governments have yet to comply with an UDHA provision to hold an inventory of available land and to distribute the same to the urban poor.

“Even the national government has been remiss in its obligation to provide proper relocation to informal settlers,” Cabanag lamented. “Our own investigation in Towerville in Bulacan shows that the houses provided to the poor, if you can call it that, are dangerously substandard and are devoid of the necessary facilities,” she added. Towerville is a massive relocation site where many of the victims of Ondoy have been relocated.

“Enough of these violent demolitions! Issue a moratorium on demolition now!,” Cabanag declared.

KAMAO is a member of SENTRO. At least 1,000 KAMAO members will march with SENTRO and link arms with NAGKAISA! on May 1.

“The workers are asking for a minimum wage that will give their families decent lives. The offer of DoLE is a pittance that only adds insult to injury as the government continues to treat the workers without respect and dignity,” said Edwin Bustillos, Deputy Secretary General of APL-SENTRO.

With a few days to go before Labor Day, APL and the newly-found labor center, SENTRO, add their voices to the growing clamor for adjustments in minimum wage levels while reiterating their demand for reforms in the wage setting mechanism.

“Truth is, we are merely asking for wage recovery rather than a real wage increase,” Bustillos said. According to government’s own figures, the purchasing power of the current daily minimum wage in the NCR of P426 is only P248.40, an erosion of 41.69%.

“Historically, the regional wage boards are susceptible to the signals given by Malacañang or by the DOLE. The statement of Secretary Baldoz is therefore a bad signal that would put a cap on the amount that the regional wage board would decide,” Bustillos said. “The wage boards have yet to prove us wrong,” he added.

“All workers, and not just minimum wage earners, deserve wage adjustments,” added Bustillos. “But unfortunately, the RWPBs are limited to minimum wage adjustments. Worst, they are usually made useless by too many exemptions, not to mention that these minimum wages are rampantly violated.”

Ultimately, the regional wage-setting mechanism should be abandoned. “The wage boards in their current set-up do not adequately respond to workers’ needs, and a new mechanism should be put in place,” Bustillos said.

The APL-SENTRO is pushing for House Bill 2512 that would rationalize wage setting. Introduced by Akbayan representatives Walden Bello and Kaka Nag-ao, the bill would institute a single minimum wage at the national level and replace the regional wage boards with industry wage boards, which will set a higher minimum wage in industries that are capable of doing so.

The bill is currently pending in the HOR Committee on Labor.

“The geographical approach taken by the wage boards now only distort wage levels around the country and perpetuate poverty as they keep wage levels low in areas where workers are already poor,” said Bustillos.

APL-SENTRO is a member of NAGKAISA!, the broadest issue-based labor coalition that was recently launched. On May Day, APL-SENTRO members will march in key cities around the country and will link arms with other members of NAGKAISA!

Branded as America’s “worst employer in the national hotel industry,” Hyatt is accused of “replacing longtime employees with minimum wage temporary workers and imposing dangerous workloads on those who remain,” adding that “Hyatt housekeepers have high rates of injury.”

What incited the Hyatt workers, after years of silence, to finally confront their employer was when all the housekeepers at three non-unionized Hyatt hotels in Boston, Massachusetts – Hyatt Regency Boston, Hyatt Regency Cambridge, Hyatt Harborside – were arbitrarily fired (with no advance notice) and replaced by temporary workers on August 31, 2009.

Called “The Hyatt 100,” the dismissed workers – some of them had worked for Hyatt for over 20 years – earned widespread support from the public and civil society organizations, led by the unions, and even from various religious groups, politicians and businesses.

The Boston protests may have inspired workers in other Hyatt hotels in the US to later raise their grievances and assert their rights, including those in Chicago, Illinois; Indianapolis, Indiana; San Antonio, Texas; Scottsdale, Arizona; Santa Clara, San Francisco and Long Beach in California; and Seattle, Washington.

The hyatthurts.org website explained that Hyatt’s subcontracting is actually “destroying good jobs and exploiting immigrant workers,” who are either deceived or forced to take jobs with much lower pay and without security of tenure.

It added that Hyatt housekeeping staffs comprise one of the most abused hotel workers in the US. For instance, they had the highest injury rate among housekeepers, according to a study – on 50 hotel facilities from five different hotel firms – published by the American Journal of Industrial Medicine.

Housekeepers or room attendants at some Hyatts have also excessive workloads as they have to clean as many as 30 rooms a day or “as little as 15 minutes” per room. Violations of occupational safety and health standards are also increasing; thus, last year, 11 Hyatt hotels were slapped with 18 citations, and three against one of Hyatt’s housekeeping subcontractors.

Likewise, Hyatt is said to have led the moves to oppose the bill in the US Congress that would have end the inhuman “‘on our knees’ bathroom cleaning and backbreaking bed-making practices.”

Several Hyatt hotels have also blatantly intervened in blocking the formation of local unions; and last year a Hyatt manager was accused of turning heat lamps “during a brutal heat wave” on striking Hyatt workers in Chicago.

Meanwhile, the National Union of Workers in Hotel, Restaurant and Allied Industries (Nuwhrain-APL-IUF), the lead organization in the picket in front of the Hyatt Hotel and Casino Manila, reaffirmed its “solidarity with the workers of Hyatt in the United States and elsewhere in the world who have suffered and continued to suffer from many forms of exploitation and abuses perpetrated by the hotel brands under the Hyatt Corporation.”

Nuwhrain-APL, an affiliate of the IUF, the biggest global federation of unions in the hotel and related industries, said that it could very much relate to the “Hyatt issue” as one of its former local members was the incumbent union in Hyatt Regency Manila until it “suspiciously closed” in 2007.

“The sudden closure of Hyatt Regency Manila reeks of deception and machination since it was not really because of bankruptcy but to avoid its obligation with the workers when they won their unfair labor practices case filed in the National Labor Relations Commission and the Court of Appeals,” Edwin Bustillos, Samahang Manggagawa sa Hyatt (Samasah) president, said.

Prior to this, Hyatt, through the Hotel Enterprises of the Philippines Inc. (HEPI), illegally sacked employees, mostly regular and union members, thus they are eligible either to return to work or payment of both separation and retirement benefits provided by law and the then existing collective bargaining agreement (CBA), Bustillos clarified.

In hindsight, the Alliance of Progressive Labor added, what happened in Hyatt Regency Manila was a classic tactic of union-busting.

Nuwhrain argued that the Hyatt Corp., as the brand owner, is as guilty as HEPI not only for failing to prevent the mass dismissal and for the continued non-implementation of the court orders, but as proven also by its later actions like what is happening in Hyatt hotels now in the US.

Started in 1957, the Chicago-based Hyatt Corporation has currently more than 430 hotel brands worldwide, including Park Hyatt, Andaz hotel, Grand Hyatt, Hyatt Regency, Hyatt Place, Hyatt house, Hyatt Resort and Hyatt Vacation Club. Grand Hyatt Manila, a 66-storey mixed-use hotel and office tower, is also being built in Taguig City.

Nuwhrain and APL are also members of the newly established labor center, the Sentro ng mga Progresibong Manggagawa or Sentro.

The youth activists criticized the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) for allowing the increase following the Department of Education’s approval of tuition fee increase in private elementary and high school institutions.

“This will no doubt aggravate the heavy burden on poor families with children trying to get to college and aiming for better livelihood opportunities. Happening at a time when state colleges and universities are having difficulties in absorbing more students amidst the measly budget provided to them by the government, the tuition fee increases will further limit the choices of students entering the tertiary level,” said Marco Gojol, APL-Youth Secretary General.

“Education is a right more than a profit-oriented business endeavor,” Gojol said. He reminded CHED that education, including tertiary education, should be made available to the poor.

APL and its allies under the Sentro ng Progresibong Manggagawa (SENTRO) have raised the bleak future of out-of-school youth as well as of new graduates who are facing the uncertainty of landing a secure and decent job.

The activists, in an earlier action, bemoaned the fact that for their generation, the promise – get a degree, get a job in the corporate world and you’ll live a better life than your parents – has long been broken.

“With the increase in tuition fee, those among us who will be forced to drop out of college will have to deal with the stark reality that landing a job will be even more difficult than those who were able to graduate from college, many of whom are still jobless,” Gojol explained.

Unemployment in this country is largely a problem affecting the youth. The youth comprise one-fifth of the labor force but they account for one-half of the total unemployed.

The group called for the re-channeling of debt servicing for illegitimate debts to education.

APL and APL-Youth are members of SENTRO, the new national labor center of various workers’ organizations in the private, informal and migrant sectors. APL-Youth, composed of teens and young adults ages 15-35 based in communities, schools and workplaces, aims to unite and empower the youth sector and to link them with the labor movement and the broader social movements.