Tell it to SunStar: Resolve decades-long labor disputes

by Sunstar, 28 Feb 2020

WE URGE the new president of Toyota Motors Philippines (TMP), Hiro Okamoto, to understand the struggles of terminated workers and resolve their decades-long labor disputes.

A social media post of Okamoto has gone viral. Okamoto, who is newly assigned as TMP president, was seen on social media spending his first week in the Philippines commuting on bus, MRT, jeepney, UV express and tricycle to “see the daily struggles of Filipino commuters.”

Aside from experiencing and understanding the plight of the Filipino commuters and the poor state of our country’s mass public transport system, we challenge Okamoto to do “Genchi Genbutsu” or to “go and see” the current situation of the 237 TMP workers who were dismissed by his company since 2001 and act upon the decades-long labor dispute with our union.

Some 233 union leaders and members of the TMPCWA were dismissed by the car manufacturing company in 2001 after then Labor secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas submitted a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) proposal to the TMP management and wrote a letter requesting for a CBA negotiation. The union then staged a strike against the illegal dismissal of its workers on March 28, 2001. Four more members of the union were dismissed by the company in August 2010.

We call on TMP president Hiro Okamoto to start his term as head of the company by doing what is right and just for the 237 workers and their families who have long-been seeking justice to the union-busting scheme and illegal massive dismissal of workers, which transpired almost two decades ago.

We challenge Okamoto to sit with us in a dialogue with the Labor Department to review our past labor dispute with the management and resolve it in the soonest possible time. The resolution of our labor issues will be a test of Okamoto’s genuine concern for Filipino workers and people.

The TMPCWA, KMU Metro Manila and Defend Jobs Philippines also call on Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III to take on the opportunity to call for a dialogue between the illegally dismissed workers and the new TMP management to resolve the issues and labor disputes in the company that transpired since 2001. (Ed Cubelo, KMU Metro Manila chairman and president of Toyota Motors Philippines Corp. Workers Association (TMPCWA))