CAAP workers complain about missing 14th month bonus

MANILA, Philippines - Rank-and-file employees of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines said yesterday the CAAP’s top officials failed to release their 14th month bonus.

“There is massive demoralization among the employees because the 14th month bonus has not been released. And we are concerned that they will use the bonus to sow intrigue among employees against the CAAP Employees Union,” Cesar Lucero, union vice president, told The STAR.

He said the 14th month bonus had been given before Christmas break in 2009 and 2010, during the administrations of former CAAP director generals Ruben Ciron and Alfonso Cusi.

“The bonus should have been issued promptly to help the employees celebrate the Christmas season. It was extremely insensitive of management not to release the bonus,” Lucero said.

The union has been critical of alleged irregularities taking place in the CAAP under its current director general, retired Philippine Air Force colonel Ramon Gutierrez.

Lucero said the CAAP was created out of its forerunner, the Air Transportation Office (ATO), and given fiscal autonomy to allow the agency to keep most of its earnings and enable it to give adequate compensation and benefits to “mission-critical” employees such as air traffic controllers and flight check pilots whose counterparts abroad are given higher pay.

The 14th month bonus was a “special benefit” that the agency was allowed to give under the CAAP Law, passed in 2009, after the country suffered a double whammy when the United States Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) downgraded the country from a Category 1 rating to Category 2 in 2007 and the International Civil Aviation Organization issuing significant safety concerns on the country’s civil aviation systems in 2008.

Lucero said that the non-release of the 14th month bonus and the demoralization it has caused will negatively affect the agency’s ongoing efforts to regain Category 1 status with the US FAA, which will conduct an audit supposedly set on Jan. 27.