By KILUSANG MAYO UNO (KMU) — CORDILLERA

January 21, 2008

The militant workers in the Cordillera Region under the flagship of the Kilusang Mayo Uno – Cordillera salute the members of the Kapatiran ng mga Empleado sa University of the Cordilleras – Baguio Colleges Foundation (UC-BCF) in the wake of their struggle for labor rights with their unselfish aim to improve their status to also enhance their effectiveness in contributing to the attainment of students’ right to quality education.

While UC gains millions from tuition and other school fees in any form or terms collected from its students, the management is disregarding its employees of their democratic rights by means of unfair labor practices and union busting. The management, according to Kapatiran, interferes, coerces and restrains its employees in the exercise of their right to self-organization by not recognizing the union president which is a gross violation to article 248 of the Philippine Labor Code stating “ that employers should not interfere, coerce and restrain any of its employees from exercising his/her right to self-organization”.

The management also violates its employees’ rights by its discriminatory policies on wages, hours of work, and other terms of employment to discourage them to join any labor organization. This is another obvious violation of the Labor Code.

While its employees do what they were expected to do in making the image of the school with dignity, the management also infringed on their Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA).

KMU criticizes UC-BCF for being notorious in employing contractualization among its employees particularly to its teaching staff. A contractual educator for example is continuously employed as contractual as he/she is renewing his/her employment from time to time.

The contractual teachers’ security of tenure is always at the edge as it depends on the imposition of the company basing it to the students’ evaluation of the performances of the teachers.

The members of the Kapatiran and all the employees of the UC-BCF have all the rights to demand what is best for them as they have helped in the development of the educational institution through the years until it reached its present status. Sincere as they are in helping the youth in their academic as well as personality development, they are noble in criticizing the management’s tricky tactic in siphoning more money from the students for instance the continuous collection of LIMAD, AVR fees etc.

The KMU-Cordillera calls on the other community educators/workers in other institutions and workplaces to support the ongoing struggle of the Kapatiran of UC-BCF and also come out in the open in exposing any form of labor exploitation and deprivation of rights!

KMU also calls on the students of UC-BCF to understand and give their utmost support to their educators and other employees of their school and stand side by side with them to build a stable environment in the quest for quality education even at the minimal stage at this time.

STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRATIC AND LABOR RIGHTS!
LONG LIVE THE KAPATIRAN NG MGA EMPLEADO NG UC-BCF!
LONG LIVE THE WORKERS! #