Filipinos protest landfill projects in 3 areas

Wearing black veil, community groups affected by proposed and existing landfill projects from San Mateo, Cavite and Navotas in the Philippines hold a protest in front of the office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to mourn the continuous contamination of watersheds and foreshore areas brought by the unabated dumping of mixed waste and construction of waste disposal facilities in their communities. The group calls for the genuine and environment-friendly solution to the country’s garbage problem. (AKP Images / Gigie Cruz)

Protest greets LWUA audit on Kidapawan water cooperative

Members of the People’s Coalition Against Privatization (People's CAP) stage a rally in front of Metro Kidapawan Water District against its privatization and eventual take over of the Local Water Utilities Administration (LWUA). The protest coincided with the scheduled audit by the LWUA on the financial status of the water cooperative, which is one of the biggest in the Philippines. (Mindanao Examiner Photo / Geo Solmerano)

Arroyo's Pictures Pelted With Tomatoes In Iligan City

Anti-Arroyo protest Monday, February 25, 2008 in Iligan City.

ILIGAN CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Feb. 25, 2008) – Filipino activists pelted with rotten tomatoes pictures of President Gloria Arroyo during a rally Monday in the southern city of Iligan.

Members of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) also demanded Arroyo’s resignation over corruption allegations that sparked huge protest rallies in the country since the past weeks.

The protest coincided with the 22nd commemoration of the EDSA People Power revolution that deposed President Ferdinand Marcos and catapulted Corazon Aquino into power in 1986.

Today’s nationwide protests by opposition and civil society groups failed to attract citizens to join the rallies that could have triggered another people power revolution.“People power fatigue is never true,” Bayan’s secretary-general Anjo Bacarisas, said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

“The people will never be tired of struggling against a President who gives them the hardest days of their lives, and the collective action of toppling this hated regime is the only way out.”

“The people’s poverty increases while Arroyo gets richer! Hunger is everywhere,” he said.

Bacarisas said Arroyo’s boasting that the country’s Gross Domestic Product has risen 7.5% was an empty reality. “The growing numbers of people instead are living with empty stomachs and it is deception on the part of this regime to paint the picture of a progressive economy.

Rising prices of basic commodities, oil price hikes, lack of jobs, low wages, land grabbing — this is the real situation of the people,” Bacarisas said.

In nearby Cagayan de Oro City, more than 500 anti-Arroyo protesters also held noise barrage and marched in downtown area calling for the president’s resignation. (Merlyn Manos)

Militant Groups Itching To March, Protest High Prices In RP

DAVAO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Dec. 12, 2007) – A broad alliance against privatization and commercialization of basic services in the southern Philippines said it would join the nationwide strike Thursday by transport groups to protest the rising cost of commodities and worsening poverty in the Philippines.

“With the rising cost of almost all basic commodities we cannot feel the strength of the peso that the Arroyo government is boasting about,” said Leon Bolcan, spokesperson of the Consumer Alert (CA).

He said the rising cost of power, water and, as seeming exemplification of how deteriorated the standard of living in the country has become.

Local prices of flour were affected by the global increase in wheat prices due to short supplies. This prompted the Philippine Federation of Bakers Association Inc., Filipino-Chinese Bakers Association Inc, and the Philippine Baking Industry Group to announce that they had been suffering for the past months due to continuous increase of prices of wheat and flour.

Data showed that the prices of flour have increased at least 6 percent a month for the past six months, forcing the bakers to increase the price of pan de sal to P2.50 this month.

CA expects this to have a harrowing repercussion on the prices of other flour-based products including noodles and snack foods.

”Pan de sal (bread) and noodles are common foods in the tables of Filipino families, 'pantawid gutom' even to some. The LPG price has already increased 13 times this year and resulted to skyrocketing prices of other basic commodities. Why can't we feel the so-called boom on the economy? We are still being pushed to the wall and reduced to living on a per day basis,” Bolcan said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

He said they will join the transport strike tomorrow to protest the decline of livelihood and worsening poverty.

“Consumers must not solely shoulder the blows of non-stop price increase. The transport strike tomorrow, in the face of worsening poverty and brazen corruption, is all the more justifiable and needs the united support of the entire Filipino people,” Bolcan said. The militant Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) also urged lawmakers to prioritize and pass bills calling for the repeal of Oil Deregulation Law and P125 wage increase for workers before their Christmas break “for the best interest of the majority of Filipinos.”

Elmer Labog, KMU chairperson, said the succeeding oil price hikes, the scheduled increases in water and power rates this month are enough reasons that workers' salaries should be immediately adjusted and a deregulated scheme in the oil industry be scrapped.

“It is unfortunate that again President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's attention and feelings are so far away from the Filipinos' cries and demands and refused to include the P125 legislated wage hike bill and repeal of the Oil Deregulation Law to the nine priority bills she wanted to be passed before Christmas break.”

“We therefore ask our lawmakers that for the best interests of their constituents to immediately respond to the issues that are nearest to the grumbling stomach of every Filipino,” Labog said.

He also warned that “widespread chaos and unrest” is inevitable in the coming weeks if prices of basic commodities and services will continue to rise while wages are nailed to the floor and accessible forms of livelihood are denied to the poor.

“The nationally-coordinated protest actions and nationwide transport strike on December 13 are just the beginning of a series of demonstrations that will rock the Arroyo government because it refuses to attend to every legitimate demand of ordinary Filipino. The Arroyo government must beware of what hungry Filipinos can do when they are pushed to the wall,” Labog said.

He said tens of thousands of workers affiliated with KMU will troop to the streets to join the nationally-coordinated protest actions against oil price hike.

Labog urged the public to support the nationwide protests and strike since a “one-day collective sacrifice” will be strong statement against the Arroyo government and the oil cartel.

“Majority of the Filipinos will benefit from the legitimate demands of the workers, drivers and other sectors during the demonstrations. The collective howl of protests reverberating nationwide on Thursday will provide a message to the Arroyo government that the Filipino people is serious in its demand for the Oil Deregulation Law be repealed, that the P3.00 EVAT in diesel be scrapped and for oil price increases be stopped immediately,” he said.

Sulu Teachers Continue Protest, Demand Unpaid Salaries

SULU, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Dec. 04, 2007) – Disgruntled government teachers continued their protest Tuesday in the southern Philippine province of Sulu, demanding salaries that remain unpaid for months now.

The strike began Monday after a few hundred teachers walked out of their school rooms to demand their wages and an investigation into alleged anomalies involving hundreds of millions of pesos in state pension contributions.

The teachers complained that they have not been paid their wages the past months by the Department of Education in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and that their contributions to the state pension agency which are worth over 600 million pesos since 2003 were also missing.

They earlier threatened to stage a mass protest should ARMM Gov. Zaldy Ampatuan fail to act on their problems. More than 5,000 teachers are currently teaching in Sulu province.

Sulu Gov. Sakur Tan on Tuesday appealed to the teachers to end their strike and return to work. Tan has ordered the creation of team, composed of teachers and education officials that will look into the problems of the teachers.

“We will look into these problems and try to resolve it peacefully in coordination with the Department of Education in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao,” he told reporters.

Tan said the teachers converged at the office of the Department of Education in Sulu province. But it was not immediately known how long the protest would be.

Lawyer Oscar Sampulna, ARMM Executive Secretary, denied the allegations and insisted the teachers received their salaries on time.

“They are receiving their salaries. Those who are complaining were temporary teachers whose special permits to teach had not been renewed or revoked basically for their lack of the proper documents required by the Department of Education,” he said.

The teachers said none from the Department of Education in ARMM or any of its representatives went to Sulu to talk to them about their complaints.

In October, more than 1,000 public school teachers sought the help of Tan and asked him to bring the matter to President Gloria Arroyo.

Abdulbasit Pawakil, president of the larger Federation of Sulu Teachers, also asked for a government audit and to investigate the problems of delayed and missing salaries and contributions to the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS).

He said that as of 2003, more than P389 million of teachers' contributions to GSIS were missing and that this has ballooned to over P600 million and yet ARMM continues to deduct insurance premiums from their salaries.

The teachers were asking for a formal Congressional or Senate investigations into the missing GSIS contributions and salaries and jail those who would be found guilty of embezzling funds. (Mindanao Examiner)

RP's High Tuition Fees Assailed

Members of the Anakbayan protest in Davao City in southern RP on Tuesday, Nov.27, 2007.

DAVAO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Nov. 27, 2007) – Members of the militant youth group Anakbayan led a picket rally Tuesday in Davao City in southern Philippines to protest the government’s failure to put a stop on continued tuition fee hikes in the country.

Students also joined the rally and picketed in front of the University of Mindanao (Bolton Campus) where they displayed streamers denouncing the unabated increase in tuition fees.

The protest also signaled the group’s commemoration of the Andres Bonifacio's Day celebrated on November 30. Bonifacio is one of the Philippines’ national heroes who led a revolt against Spain in 1896. “Nothing has significantly changed for the better since the 1896 Revolution led by Andres Bonifacio – the Filipinos are still poor and oppressed, the youth deprived of an affordable and quality education.”

“Statistics and surveys would show that more Filipinos are hungry, more youth dropping out of school or not ever stepping into formal education (8% of all six-year olds o 200,000 Filipino children will never ever step into school and 1 million cannot enter high school every year), more unemployed, more and more leaving the country (3,400 per day) to work abroad,” Karla Hyasmind Apat, Anakbayan regional spokesperson, said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

“In the education sector in particular, the government's policy is to push for the rationalization and soon privatization of state universities and colleges in the country, while passing on into the private sector the responsibility of providing education to its citizen,” she said.

She said education in the country has now become very expensive that forced many students to stop schooling. She also assailed private universities and schools in Davao City for taking advantage of the students.

“Private universities and schools in Davao City continue to rake in millions of pesos as profits from the students, yet they continue to increase their tuition and other fees. Education is being driven into becoming a business enterprise. Ateneo for instance, earns millions of pesos a year from its space rentals alone, yet, it continues to increase its tuition and other fees,” Apat said. (Mindanao Examiner)

Filipinos Celebrate Labor Day With Street Rallies, Protests

MANILA (Mindanao Examiner / 01 May) – Thousands of workers and members of progressive groups have staged street rallies Tuesday to mark the celebration of the International Labor Day.

”May Day is an occasion for us to celebrate the fruits of our battle against oppression, the butchery of free-market globalization and the US imperialist-led war of terror.”

“In the same breath, we celebrate our hard earned victories and further intensify the struggle of the working-class against the isolated and much-hated U.S.-Gloria Macapagal Arroyo regime,” said Elmer Labog, chairman of the militant group, Kilusang Mayo Uno party, which led the rallies in Manila.

"Arroyo's isolation from the masses is heightening. She will soon find her proper place and the May 14 election is just the beginning of her political annihilation,” Labog said.

KMU is opposed to trade agreements between the Philippines and the United States. It said the U.S. is exploiting the Philippines and other poor countries in Asia to advance its own interests.
In southern Philippines, around 10,000 workers from the provinces of Davao del Norte, Compostela Valley, Davao Oriental and Davao City also joined street protests and demanded more labor benefits.

"Today is a significant day to the Filipino people. In times of great crisis, the workers and the toiling masses shall exhibit its unceasing and unbreakable spirit of defiance against the attacks of the Arroyo regime," said Omar Bantayan, secretary general of KMU in Southern Mindanao and also vice president of the Anakpawis party list group for Mindanao.

Bantayan said the Arroyo regime is culpable of the destruction of the lives of the Filipino people, as it permitted large-scale capital to exploit labor power and siphon all possible super-profits and consistently denied the workers a significant and reasonable increase in wages.

“Arroyo and her cohorts have sabotaged the passage of the HB345 (Beltran P125 Bill) which would give significant relief to the workers by approximating the depressed wage levels with the projected family living wage. At present, the daily minimum wage in Region XI is pegged at P228 while the daily cost of living is P621.”

“There is no truth to the claim of the Arroyo administration and big business that the P125 wage increase will cause destruction of the people's livelihood," Bantayan said. "A constricted market, unfair competition, lack of finances and regressive taxation are the main causes of retrenchments and closures of small and medium-scale enterprises.”

While militant political groups denounced Arroyo, the President inaugurated on Labor Day a four-storey "workers’ inn" in Manila for “urban workers whose homes are not within convenient commuting distance from Metro Manila.”

Called “Gwapotel: Tulugan sa Bayan,” the dormitory-style bed and bath facility is a joint project of the Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA) and the National Power Corporation (Napocor), a government statement said.

Strategically located at the former Napocor Building along Bonifacio Drive in Port Area in Manila, the temporary living facility, also dubbed "PGMA’s Workers’ Inn," provides transients affordable rooms to stay.

The President was joined by Metro-Manila Development Authority chairman Bayani Fernando, National Power Corporation (Napocor) chief Cyril del Callar and Department of Science and Technology Secretary Estrella Alabastro in the ceremonial unveiling of the marker and ribbon-cutting activities formally opening to the public the sleeping and bathing facility.

According to Fernando, the 700-bed Gwapotel was conceptualized under the President's pro-poor program of providing clean and affordable living quarters to every Filipino, particularly provincial residents who work in Metro Manila.

Fernando said that under PGMA's Worker's Inn program, the Gwapotel is designed to provide an affordable albeit temporary sleeping and bathing facility for workers whose homes are not within convenient commuting distance to their places of work in Metro Manila.

“Gwapotel will provide relief and added rest time to workers who need to commute daily to and from their residences in the provinces,” Fernando said, adding that it was among the wage benefits the President gave to the Filipino workers this Labor Day.

The dormitory-style Gwapotel is divided as follows: the third and fourth floors are allocated to provide sleeping and bathing facilities for male customers while the second floor is allocated for women clients. (Mindanao Examiner)

Students Hold Peaceful Protest vs Political Oppression In South RP

DAVAO CITY (Mindanao Examiner / 21 Mar) – Students and members of the Kabataan (Youth) party list group, protesting alleged government persecution of political activists in the Philippines, held a peaceful rally Wednesday in Davao City.

Singing cultural songs and reciting poems in front of the University of Mindanao, the protesters accused Manila of political persecution. They also condemned the unabated political killings allegedly perpetrated by the military in the country.

Karla Apat, vice president for Mindanao of Kabataan party list group, said the government failed to address the many problems besetting the country.

“We are of course worried by the how the government is addressing ourproblems – instigating repression instead of answering the people'sdemands and basic needs.”

“Lack of priority to address the basic needs of citizens leads to 3.4 millionFilipino households hungry, lesser number of students who completeelementary and high school education, increased number of unemployedgraduates, proliferation of child laborers, among others,” Apat said.

The protesters later lighted candles and offered prayers to victims of injustice. (With a report from Romy Bwaga)

UP-Mindanao Besieged By Tuition Hike Protests

MEMBERS OF THE KABATAAN PARTY LIST and students of the University of the Philippines held picket rallies Friday in Davao City in the southern Philippines in time for the 1217th Board of Regents meeting of the UP system.

UP students are protesting a recent 300% hike in tuition fees.

Backed by members of various student groups from other schools and the Kabataan Party list, the students held a rally in front of the Grand Men Seng Hotel during the UP alumni gathering.

"We wanted to ask the support of our alumni in demanding for a repeal of the recent increase in tuition," Raymond Basilio, chairman of the University Student Council in UP Mindanao, said in a press statement.

Basilio’s group later proceeded in front of UP’s School of Management along Anda Street where the University Board of Regents were discussing new UP policies and the tuition fee increase.

"Parents of iskolars ng bayan will have to shell out an estimate of P 11, 600 to enroll in UP Mindanao for a regular load of 18 units. A far cry from the P 4, 500 a UP Mindanao student is paying at present," Basilio said.

"It is known that, more often than not, UP programs and policies serve as a blueprint for other colleges and universities to follow. If UP manages to get away with a 300% increase in its tuition and other fees, what would stop other colleges and universities from following the very same steps?" he added.

Karlos Manlupig, coordinator of Kabataan Party list coordinator, said the school year is about to end yet private schools and the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) seemed adamant in not taking necessary steps to settle the issue of the illegal implementation of tuition and other fee hikes.

Manlupig was referring to the CHED Memo No.14 or the guidelines for applications for tuition and other fee increases."It has been declared illegal by the House Committee on Education but private schools are still using it as an excuse to raise tuition fees," Manlupig said.

Karla Hyasmind Apat, Kabataan Party list vice-president for Mindanao, said with the present economic condition, the increase in tuition fee will only serve as a burden to the parents of UP students.