CLARK FREEPORT -- A labor group has expressed support to the employees affected by the privatization of Clark International Airport.
“The Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP) and its member unions and affiliates extends its hand in solidarity to our embattled brothers at the Clark International Airport in their struggle against union-busting bureaucrats and corporate greed,” the group stated in a letter to the editor sent to SunStar Pampanga.
Just recently, the Samahan ng Manggagawa ng Diosdado Macapagal International Airport or SMD, the sole bargaining unit of the employees of Clark International Airport Corporation (CIAC) in their bid to secure their jobs as their company is forging a 25-year concession agreement with a consortium of private firms for the operations and management of both the old and new terminals, held a strike vote with only thirteen voting against the strike.
“The union’s fears and demands are not novel. The veil surrounding the privatization plan of one of the first projects under the Duterte administration’s Build, Build, Build infrastructure program only adds to the legitimacy of their demand and grievances. At this point in time, the total paralysis of the airport’s operations maybe the only language their management can comprehend for them to come to terms,” the BMP said.
The labor added that the refusal of the airport management to negotiate the economic provisions under its collective bargaining agreement (CBA) for the years 2016 to 2020 is only fueling doubts in CIAC’s sincerity to absorb the workers once the recently awarded concession agreement is in full swing in the next 180 days.
The management has yet to pay the workers’ CBA benefits from 2011 to 2018. The unjust removal of the workers’ life, health and retirement benefits clearly constitute unfair labor practices by the management, according to the BMP.
The history of public sector unionism has been dotted with anti-privatization struggles, the group said.
“There is damning evidence to prove that workers have suffered the brunt in these privatization schemes. It is now a matter of fact that the primary objective of corporate spin offs is to bust labor unions in order to take down costs by replacing tenured and unionized employees with cheap, contractual workers to make the project more palatable to investors,” the BPM added.
“The blatant disregard for labor rights and unjustified sale of public assets by the CIAC management and its holding company, the Bases Conversion Development Authority to feed the unsatiable appetite for profits of corporate vultures is reasonably a strikeable issue,” the BPM claimed.