Teachers’ woes

The best of intentions sometimes are not enough.

Under Republic Act 10964 or the General Appropriations Act of  2018, it was provided that deductions from salaries and other benefits accruing to any government employee may be allowed for the payment of employee contributions or obligations subject to a specific order of preference.

Loans or contributions to the BIR, Philhealth, GSIS and HDMF are first, followed by those owing to non-stock savings and loan associations and mutual benefit associations managed by and/or for the benefit of government employees. Third on the list are those to associations or provident funds organized and managed by government employees for their benefit and welfare; fourth, government financial institutions; fifth, licensed insurance companies; and lastly, loans to thrift banks and rural banks.

The same law also provides that in no case shall these deductions reduce the employee’s monthly net take home pay to an amount lower than P5,000.

To implement this, the Department of Education issued Department Order 5 (2018) which reiterated that the net take home pay (NTHP) threshold is mandatory so that any financial obligation incurred by any DepEd personnel shall not be deducted from his monthly salary if such deduction will lower his NTHP beyond the P5,000 threshold.

Except for the first category (BIR, etc.), the DepEd order said that “first-in, first-served” system, which is based on the date of receipt of the authority to deduct, shall be applied to contributions and obligations within each category. It added that there shall be no splitting of deductions covered by categories other than the first.

Let me give an illustration. Let us say than a public school teacher’s monthly salary is P20,000. After taxes, Philhealth, GSIS and HDMF contributions which are first on the list of allowable deductions, what is left is probably P15,000. If the same teacher has borrowed money from a non-stock SLA and the monthly amortization is P5,000 and said SLA has secured an authority to deduct, her salary is reduced further to P10,000. What if the same teacher secured a loan from Land Bank and the monthly amortization is P4,000, what remains of her salary is P6,000. If this teacher got another loan from a private thrift bank and she has to pay P3,000 every month for the loan, the private thrift bank does not get paid. Why? Because the NTHP threshold is P5,000. Why not give the bank P1,000? The DepEd order says no splitting of deductions and so the bank does not get a single centavo.

What makes matters worse, especially for those in the lower part of the order of preference is a provision in DO 5 which says that the order shall apply to both existing and new obligations, which actually negates the “first-in, first-served system.”

So if the same teacher gets a new loan from another SLA, this new loan gets priority over her loan with Land Bank and the private thrift bank. This time, it is possible that Land Bank will not get paid.

The same DepEd order warns its personnel that delay in the payment of loans may result in the imposition of penalties and accrued interests by the private lending institutions and the GSIS so that DepEd personnel whose loans are not deducted under the auto payroll deduct system (APDS) are advised to pay their loans directly to their respective lenders.

We learned that DO 5 has been suspended but this will be lifted soon. And public school teachers and other employees are not happy about this.

What is the unintended consequence of this policy? Many private lending institutions including banks no longer want to lend to DepEd personnel because there is no assurance that the loans will get paid. And because of this, teachers and other employees will be forced to borrow money from loan sharks just to tide them over to the next pay day.

Anomalous situation

Who would expect that the fight for the leadership of the minority in the House of Representatives would be this ugly?

There are now three groups claiming that they should be the one who are entitled to be called the minority bloc in the Lower Chamber. These are the groups of former speaker Pantaleon Alvarez and former majority leader Rep. Rodolfo Farinas, that of current House Minority Leader Rep. Danilo Suarez, and that of Rep. Romero Quimbo.

How did Alvarez end up being in the minority bloc when he belongs to the ruling PDP-Laban party, the same party to which newly elected Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo belongs to?

A few days ago, ABS party-list Rep. Eugene Michael de Vera said he had accepted the application of Alvarez and Farinas, among others former members of the majority to the House minority.

Both Alvarez-Farinas and Quimbo are saying that all members of the minority who voted for Arroyo to be House Speaker automatically became members of the majority bloc. And since Suarez supported Arroyo, he effectively abandoned the post of minority leader.

But then there are those who are saying that Suarez is still the minority leader since the rules which Alvarez-Farinas and Quimbo are invoking could only be applied during the initial organization of the House and not to succeeding elections for speakership.

There are those who was to elevate the matter to the Supreme Court. But time and again, the High Tribunal has consistently held that matters pertaining to House internal rules are governed by the political question doctrine and are therefore not justiciable or not subject to judicial review.

If Alvarez wants to be the next minority leader, then he should resign from the ruling party. Earlier, Caloocan City Rep. Edgar Erice said it would be highly anomalous to have a body where the majority and minority leaders belong to the same political party.

Some people just can’t accept the fact that their days of power are over.

For comments, e-mail at [email protected]