GSIS Act of 1997 patently anti-labor

I was surprised the other day to find in my e-mail a press release from the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) saying that effective March 2010, survivorship pensions extended to spouses of deceased members will be stopped if they are gainfully employed in government or the private sector.

In explaining its move, the GSIS referred to Section 20 of Republic Act 8291, or the GSIS Act of 1997, which states that only “dependent” spouses and children of deceased members are qualified to receive survi-vorship benefits.

The press release said that “a legitimate spouse who is gainfully employed is not entitled to receive the survivorship benefit because he/she is not dependent on his/her spouse for support.”

The GSIS cited a Supreme Court decision denying a contested application for survivorship pension, saying that “in order to be entitled to the survivorship benefit under RA 8291, the beneficiary must be dependent upon the GSIS member or pensioner for support.”

It was obvious that the concerned applicant for survivorship benefit was gainfully employed and was not, under the purview of the law, entitled to the pension.

I was surprised to read the press release because the enforcement of the law in March next year will hit my daughter-in-law, a nurse in Saudi Arabia, who has been the recipient of a measly survivorship benefit following the death of her husband (my son) in May last year.

The GSIS move will also hurt millions of similarly gainfully employed spouses who are now receiving survivorship benefits.

According to the GSIS, it will start suspending the monthly benefits of spouses of deceased pensioners who may be found to be gainfully employed or have other sources of income, “starting with GSIS personnel who are survivorship pensioners.”

The passage of the GSIS law on May 30, 1997, during the term of President Fidel V. Ramos was widely hailed as a “most welcome amendment to the 20-year-old revised Charter of the GSIS, known as Presidential Decree No. 1146.”

The law’s authors said R.A. 8291 “not only increased and expanded the social security protection of the government workers but it also enhanced the powers and functions of the GSIS to better respond to the needs of its membership.”

But to my mind (and certainly in the view of other pensioners like me), the law emasculated rather than expended the benefits of its members and their dependents.

The rationale of giving a survivorship pension is to help a spouse recover from income loss arising from the death of her husband, the family breadwinner. To deprive her of the benefit because she happens to have a job actually punishes her. What a paradox!

There are some other parts of R.A. 8291 that restrict rather than expand benefits for members. The law makes, for instance, a fine distinction between “salary” and “allowance” as a mode of payment to determine whether an employee is a member or not of the GSIS.

While membership in the GSIS is compulsory for all government workers, whether temporary, casual, permanent or contractual, those who are receiving a “salary” are deemed as members but not those receiving allowance, per diems or honoraria.

My son, Gil, who died last year, had served in government for more than 35 years but his family did not receive the burial benefit. The reason: he was not a GSIS member at the time of his death because in the last two years of his employment, he was a contractual paid not with a salary but allowance.

He was not even paid the full face value of his life insurance for the same reason—he was not a member as earlier explained. All his family will receive, according to the GSIS, is the cash value of his paid premiums, minus his indebtedness, if any.

I am sure that stopping the survivorship pensions of beneficiaries who are gainfully employed, gainfully engaged in business or currently receiving other pensions will create tensions or provoke protests from GSIS members.

The law is patently anti-labor, oppressive, inhuman and unjust. Something must be done to amend it, repeal its onerous provisions, or overhaul it entirely and change it with a more kindly measure. –Alfredo G. Rosario, Manila Times

agr0324@yahoo.com