Bank employees hold rally at BSP vs unfair labor practices

MANILA, Philippines — Around 100 bank employees went to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Friday to protest alleged massive contractualization and “union busting.”

Joseph Macalinao, president of the Philippine National Bank Employees Association, said more than 7,000 of their peers have lost their jobs since 2000 because of BSP’s Memorandum Circular 268, which allowed banks to contractualize and outsource key departments in banking.

“Ang kinatatakot namin dito ay ang mga anak namin dahil wala na silang papasukang regular na trabaho [What we are afraid of is that our children might no longer have regular jobs],” said Iggy Ballesteros, president of the Bank of Philippine Islands (BPI) Employees Union.

He added that MC 268, approved in December 2000, prohibited the formation of unions, placing the job security of current bank employees at risk.

Macalinao said MC 268 initially covered only six departments: credit investigation and appraisal, credit card services, information technology, clearing operations, security, and messengerial.

But Macalinao said more circulars were issued, increasing the coverage of MC 268 to include tax management and financial accounting departments.

“Wala na kaming job security [We no longer have job security],” he added.
China Bank, BPI, GE Money Bank, and Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. employees handed a manifesto from 18 banks seeking the “repeal MC 268 and to open a dialogue with union leaders to come up with amenable solutions to MC 268,” said Macalinao.

Union groups will also hand copies of the manifesto to the Senate, Congress, and Department of Labor and Employment, Ballesteros said.–Abigail Kwok, INQUIRER.net