INFOGRAPHIC | Worsening contractualization in gov’t alarms state workers
An alarming pattern has surfaced in government agencies in recent years, as far as state workers are concerned: regular employment in government offices is increasingly being replaced with contractual work. The practice of labor contractualization — employing workers on a contractual basis, without security of tenure and benefits as well as right to unionize — […]
An alarming pattern has surfaced in government agencies in recent years, as far as state workers are concerned: regular employment in government offices is increasingly being replaced with contractual work.
The practice of labor contractualization — employing workers on a contractual basis, without security of tenure and benefits as well as right to unionize — has been the bane to private-sector workers worldwide, and is considered a direct attack on workers rights. As a neoliberal policy imposed on developing countries by international financial institutions like the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, labor contractualization allows for monopoly capitalists to extract further profits from workers while pressing down their wages and curtailing their rights. But increasely, this anti-worker practice is now being done in government–the very same institution that should be protecting workers’ rights.
The Confederation for Unity, Recognition, and Advancement of Government Employees (Courage), a national center of government employees in the Philippines, is now sounding the alarm on creeping contractualization in government.
“In the government, they call these employees as contractuals, job orders (JO), Contract of Service employees, Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) employees, Talents, project-based (employees), etc. But unlike in the private sector where ‘endo’ or end of contract is common to mean five or six months employment contracts, in government we call it end of time–contractual for a number of years depending on the whims and discretions of the heads of the agencies,” explained Ferdinand Gaite, national president of Courage.
The group recently launched its campaign to ban contractualization, and pushes hard to make contractuals in various government agencies as regular.
I. INFOGRAPHIC: Contractualization in PH Government
II. MAP: Contractualization Among Government Workers in the Philippines
(Click on pins for data of contractual government workers per region)
View Map: Contractualization In PH Public Sector in a full screen map
