Indignant workers of Hanjin Subic Shipyard along with their families will hold talks with the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) as the Korean ship manufacturer awaits investors to infuse operational funding.
Hanjin Subic Shipyard has attained its stature as 4th largest shipbuilding facility in Asia on the backs of the toil and skills of Filipino workers.
At its peak, Hanjin Heavy Industries and Constructions Co. , Ltd. (HHIC -Phils. Inc) based in Subic, Zambales employed more than 33,000 workers, all of whom were contractuals and divided into local contractors.
The workers were subject to an unstable employment environment,low wages,fed maggot-infested food in the company cafeteria, vulnerable to abuse under their Korean foremen (kicks, blows and verbal abuse) and had to contend with gross disregard for health and safety measures in the workplace.
Disregarding the safety standards have resulted in major deaths of workers, minor accidents and even sickness among the workers from malaria to lung ailments which has been documented by the workers’s association, Samahan ng Manggagawa ng Hanjin or SAMAHAN since 2006.
Shortcuts in the standards have impacted the quality of their production with the Korean managed firm increasingly doubling the work hours of workers to more than 60 hours at a duration (“overnight-over day schemes “) producing ships 50 percent faster. The workers produce a ship in three months instead of the standard six months, which severely impact workers’ health.
The high turn over of workers has depleted the core of skilled workers down to 1,200 ( or forty percent of the remaining 3,000 workers) from an ideal of 8,000 to 10,000 workers of core skilled workers.
Now, with HHIC-Philippines filing for bankruptcy and its future unclear, workers are appealing to the Labor Department to ensure that the company will make good in its legally-binding obligations like separation pay and other benefits.
Other demands include they be given priority once the company reopens and the employment bond given by workers to Hanjin management be given back to them.
Furthermore, SAMAHAN along with labor center Workers for Peoples Liberation (WPL-MAKABAYAN) is appealing to the Labor department for an unemployment compensation to tide over the affected worker families while they are in between jobs and are asking agencies like the PAG-IBIG to consider a moratorium on mortgage payments.
WPL-MAKABAYAN added the skilled labor force of Filipinos remain largely undervalued with government bent on attracting unstable, vulnerable and dangerous work via foreign investment.
” It defies logic that we are allowing foreign workers to come in and do as they please, while we lock in our people to slave-like conditions at a pittance. We long to see real change in our employment landscape with stable jobs and humane working conditions,” added WPL spokesperson Primo Amparo.
Hanjin workers and their families are set to go to DOLE National Office in Intramuros on Monday, January 28, 2019 to hold a dialogue with Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello .