“A workers’ group praising the No. 1 violator of workers’ rights. Disgusting.”
That was how labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno described the Associated Labor Unions’ praises for the military in connection with a summit on workers’ rights attended by the latter, some labor groups and the Labor department last July 21, saying ALU is doing propaganda work for the main violator of workers’ rights.
In a press release dated July 23, ALU national vice-president Gerard Seno said the summit signals “a serious paradigm shift” for the Armed Forces of the Philippines while ALU area vice-president for the Visayas Michael Mendoza said “The workers [sic] are partners and not the enemy of the soldiers in AFP’s bid to winning the peace.”
“It is simply disgusting to see a labor group claiming to be ‘the country’s pioneer in championing the plight [sic] of the Filipino workers’ praising the government’s main instrument in violating workers’ rights. ALU is in effect washing blood from the hands of the military in numerous cases of trade-union rights violations,” said Lito Ustarez, KMU vice-chairperson.
“Talk is cheap and a military-sponsored summit on workers’ rights cannot by any stretch of the imagination be seen as a signal of a paradigm shift for the AFP. No less than a change in the country’s trade-union rights situation must be seen before any change in the military can be claimed and proclaimed,” he added.
“The rampant violation of trade-union rights is the clearest proof that the military considers workers as enemies and targets, not partners, in its operations. As far as Filipino workers are concerned, ‘winning the peace’ is just a euphemism for pursuing a militaristic solution to the raging insurgency in the country, which has gravely affected workers’ rights,” he said.
Independent labor NGO Center for Trade-Union and Human Rights or CTUHR reported that from July 2010 to June 2011, it was able to monitor 62 cases of rights violations in the labor sector alone, affecting some 2,519 victims.
“ALU can repeatedly brag about its ‘undying commitment to upheld workers plight [sic],’ but as long as it does not recognize the AFP’s role in violating workers’ rights, it will continue to act like the latter’s propaganda machine, whitewashing the AFP’s crimes,” Ustarez said.
“We are calling on ALU’s member unions who, we are sure, have witnessed the military committing trade-union rights violations to rebel against their leaders’ pro-military and anti-worker stand,” he added. Lito Ustarez, KMU Vice Chairperson
