Council oks proposed ban vs publishing fired workers

The city council's committee on laws has recently recommended the approval of an ordinance prohibiting the publication of pictures and names of dismissed or terminated employees.

Committee chairman Edgardo Labella said the proposed ordinance, sponsored by councilor Eduardo Rama, is meant to protect terminated workers from acts detrimental to their dignity as human beings, and to their chances for gainful employment and career development.

Labella agreed that publishing the picture of a dismissed or terminated worker in a newspaper or magazine of general circulation raises the presumption of untrustworthiness or wrongdoing.

"This is unfair, to say the least," he said.

Some companies usually publish the pictures and names of their dismissed or terminated employees with a warning to the public that "any transactions entered into by these people after their termination is no longer honored by them."

The committee said the Rama proposal must be approved "considering that the Local Government Code stresses on social justice, economic prosperity and gainful employment."

The Labella committee pushed also for the conduct of a public hearing about the matter to give chance to those who will be affected to air their sides.

The council is set to invite representatives of the three major newspapers in Cebu City and other publications and obtain their views that would eventually be incorporated in the provisions of the proposed ordinance. - Rene U. Borromeo