PRC asked to check needs of new Maritime course

The Cebu City Council has called on the Professional Regulations Commission to examine closely the new management level course designed by the Maritime Training Council as a requirement for seafarers who wants to move up to management level positions.

Councilor Edgardo Labella’s resolution, approved by the council, wants the PRC to determine if the mandatory course requirement follows the law or the International Maritime Organization’s Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping.

Labella made this move after many Filipino seamen, including those from Cebu City, allegedly reacted adversely to the requirement of the course that was initiated by the Department of Labor and Employment.

Many seamen narrated their experience on the imposition on them of some courses that they completed over a 5-year period but only to be scrapped later on by the government maritime agencies.

They lost time and money on these courses, the seamen complained, especially now that another new course is being required.

“It appears that the patience of hundreds of seafarers seem to be nearing snapping point when they reportedly trooped to the Office of the PRC in Manila to express their dissent to what they termed as ‘abusive training requirements’ ... imposed on them by way of a resolution emanating from the Maritime Training Council,” Labella said.

DOLE came up with the mandatory course as an offshoot of a study, which revealed that only one out of every three seamen functions as ship officers in foreign ships.

The course was intended to improve the competence of Filipino seamen, DOLE said, by requiring junior maritime officers to complete it before qualifying for senior officer positions. 

Many seamen from the Philippines consider the sudden introduction of the course “quite akin to interim courses imposed on them in 2002 bereft of proper consultation,” said Labella.

The councilor said that it is now imperative to have a definite solution on the matter because it might instead hinder the growth of seafaring and its profile as a preferred profession among the youth.

Sen. Richard Gordon earlier delivered a privilege speech calling for a probe on the alleged concocted training courses being imposed on seamen, that turned out neither part of the law nor agreed upon during the International Maritime Organization’s STCW Convention in 1995.   — Joeberth M. Ocao/RAE