05 October 2018
STRIKING WORKERS OF POSH CONDO TO GO ON HUNGER STRIKE
Barely two months on strike and with no positive response from their management, workers of an upscale condominium in Bonifacio Global City decided to go on an indefinite hunger strike to press their demands for reinstatement and regularization.
Union members Abdul Tambungalan, Judy Pastorpede, Victor Vallega Jr and Lino Revilla, employees of Pacific Plaza Towers said in a statement to the media that they have been left with no other option in order for the building management to heed their constitutionally guaranteed rights to security of tenure.
“If this will be our final act for our grievances to be heard and for the exploitation to end then so be it. The PPT is already slowly killing us and our families, it would be better to die a slow death with a noble purpose than being killed slowly and painfully under this atrocious capitalist system,” the strikers said.
“We have done everything in our power to assert our rights but the management have dismissed all our pleas and conciliation efforts, they have connived with the local police detachment and BGC marshalls to break our legitimate strike, they have consistently harassed our picketline since day one,” they added.
The employees complain that the PPT has dismissed three regular employees on baseless allegations of sabotage and are also in the process of dismissing the remaining workers.
Just recently, the management of PPT filed for a temporarry restraining order before the National Labor Reconciliation Commission against their picketline on the unfounded claim of obstructing students because the picketline is on a designated bus stop and obstruction of a fire hyrant
.
The union, Pacific Plaza United Action of Labor - SUPER Federation says the allegations have weak evidence and has been countered with their own evidence. The NLRC as of press time has not acted on the petition for a TRO.###
WHAT WENT ON BEFORE
Employees of Pacific Plaza Towers went on strike on August 6 after the building management refused to reinstate and regularize seventeen (17) workers they wrongly regarded to be employees of Polystar Manpower Agency, instead of being directly absorbed as regular employees and accorded with security of tenure, rights, and benefits under the Labor Code.
The retrenched employees were joined by the remaining seventeen (17) workers the PPT management deemed ‘regular employees’, in a concerted effort to bring the condominium’s operations to a standstill and force the management to grant them their demands.
The union allege that PPT management is a union-busting after two of its officers were included among those retrenched. Other violations committed include the non-remittance of SSS, Pag-ibig, and Philhealth contributions despite being deducted from our semi-monthly pay; delayed salaries and undisclosed deductions by Polystar; failure to meet Occupational Health and Safety Standards; failure to fully apply the P21/day wage increase issued by the Regional Wage Board on October 2017; and many others.
Pacific Plaza Towers is home to rich Filipino luminaries, politicians (including two Senators), media personalities, expats, and foreign dignitaries.###
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