Friday, July 18, 2008 Teachers to protest GSIS's 'premium-based' policy
A PUBLIC school teachers' group on Thursday announced that they will spearhead the formation of a coalition of government workers to lobby against the "premium-based" policy of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS).
The group will also fight the continued collection of questionable deductions and charges on active and retired teachers' salaries and retirement benefits.
Fidel Pababier, secretary-general of the Action and Solidarity for the Empowerment of Teachers (Assert), said they are now mobilizing "victims" of unfair and unjust policies being implemented by GSIS president Winston Garcia under a coalition dubbed "Nagkakaisang Biktima ng GSIS or Bigkis."
"When formed, Bigkis will hold a series of mass actions calling for a stop to the unfair policies being implemented by Winston Garcia at the GSIS that go against its mandate of providing assistance and benefits to government workers," Pababier said.
"We're finished now with dialogues with DepEd and GSIS. We are now taking our fight to the level," he said.
He said retired and active public school teachers, principals, and Department of Education (DepEd) division and regional officers have long been complaining of the huge deductions in their salaries and retirement benefits from their supposed failure to pay their member contributions and loan payments.
"We have countless cases of teachers' getting much diminished take-home pay as a result of deductions for their supposed failure to pay their contributions or pay loan payments for salary and housing loans they availed of in the past," he said.
"How can we fail to pay our contributions and other loan payments when these are being deducted automatically in our salary because of the automatic payment deduction scheme that is in force at DepEd," Pababier said.
Pababier pointed out that it was unfair for GSIS to penalize public school teachers for the inefficiencies in the GSIS's and DepEd's system.
"The non-payment of contributions and other loan payments was a result of problems in the DepEd system. DepEd and GSIS have both admitted that these were caused by non-updated service records of teachers. So why are they penalizing public school teachers for their mistakes with penalties and interests and other surcharges," Pababier said.
Citing as example the case of Evelyn Santos, a teacher at the Sagad High School in Pasay City, the group said her problem was emblematic of the pension fund agency's supposed failure to provide to its members adequate services.
Santos complained to GSIS last December 20 why there are no salary deductions in her pay slip when she has outstanding loans. Despite repeated requests her latest salary failed to reflect the salary deduction.
Pababier said the teacher is fearful that one day, like in other cases, she will receive the accumulated salary deductions and will be unable to pay the amount.
Earlier, DepEd National Employees Union president Domingo Alidon also raised similar issue and called on GSIS to likewise stop the "premium-based" policy saying that it contradicts the mandate of the agency.
Under the premium-based policy, benefits due a member is based on the number of years that the GSIS posted one's payments from DepEd or any government agency.
Critics of the policy said the law provides that computation should be based on the numbers of years of service of a government employee.
They likewise said they have not received their dividends for the past three years for no apparent reason.
"There is no legal basis for not paying our rightful dividends without G-WAP enrollment. It is clear to us that Garcia is making his own laws to enable him to use our funds for his personal crusades," Alidon said.
G-WAP is a computer system used for the processing of loan transactions. It includes the E-card where all details of a GSIS member could be accessed.
Of the GSIS's 1.3 million members, 567,800 are teachers and non-teaching personnel of DepEd.
Sun.Star tried but failed to contact Garcia or any GSIS officials for a comment on the issue. (AH/Sunnex)
