Teachers demand higher salaries

MANILA, Philippines — Over 500 teachers and school personnel joined yesterday’s Labor Day protests to demand higher salaries, adequate benefits, education reforms and respect for union rights.

“Our teachers can no longer endure the sub-human work conditions in our schools wherein we were forced to teach in cramped and hot classrooms, made to take on non-teaching duties, paid salaries below livable levels and still obligated to spend on classrooms needs,” Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) chairman Vladimer Quetua said.

“We are also geared to push back harder the red-tagging against our unions and violations against our union rights, such as the various delaying tactics of the management on our collective negotiation agreement process and human rights violations against our leaders and members,” he added.

The group held a Flores de Mayo- themed protest dubbed “Protesta de Mayo.”

The protest featured teachers dressed as Flores de Mayo queens, Reyna Poorita, Reyna Haggarda, Reyna Abonada, Reyna Walang Pahinga, Reyna Pinaasa, Reyna Fiona, Reyna Alay and Reyna Sablay to represent the underpaid, overworked under-supported and red-tagged status of teachers in the country.

Before marching to Mendiola in Manila to join other labor and activist groups, teachers belonging to ACT also held Zumba dance protests at the Quezon City Memorial Circle, Caloocan High School, Parañaque Science High School and Barangka Elementary School in Marikina.

Teachers’ protest rallies were also simultaneously held in Baguio City, Rizal, Laguna, Iloilo City, Bacolod City, Cebu City and Davao City “to press the government to grant the much-needed salary increase.”

“The year 2023 is a crucial year for us teachers. The last tranche of benefits under the Salary Standardization Law V is set to end this year and we will not allow Congress not to pass any law for a new round of salary increase because our current salary is way below the living wage,” Quetua said in Filipino.

Meanwhile, a member of the House committee on higher education wants the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) to have access to “unprogrammed funds” in the 2023 General Appropriation Act to prevent tuition hike in private colleges and universities.

In a statement, Bohol Rep. Kristine Alexie Tutor urged the Department of Budget and Management to allow CHED to tap such funds so it can augment its tertiary education subsidy for college students in private colleges and universities. –Sheila Crisostomo, Cecille Suerte Felipe