Union to seek ILO help on labor row

The employees union of City Savings Bank will be seeking refuge in the International Labor Organization on the alleged “inability or unwillingness” of the Department of Labor and Employment to resolve the deadlock of the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the union and CSB.

Jose Umali Jr., president of the National Union of Bank Employees, said the CSB employees union will not have any other recourse but seek international assistance if the DOLE regional office would continue to delay the resolution of the dispute.

“We will bring this matter to the International Labor Organization…we will fill a case against the national government and DOLE for being partial and indifferent,” Umali said in a press conference yesterday.

“The NUBE finds lamentable the seeming impotence of the regional office of the DOLE in the face of management’s intransigence. It has been unable, or unwilling, to propose measures to resolve the CBA deadlock. Such inability or unwillingness speaks of bias and partiality of the DOLE regional office for the management of City Savings Bank,” the union alleged.

The union said it has always been willing to continue negotiations since the CBA reached a deadlock in December last year, however, the CSB management has allegedly resisted efforts to conciliate and has instead taken a “take-it-or-leave-it attitude” as regards its counter-offer to the union’s demands.

The union has asked for six percent plus P1,200 wage increase but the CSB management has counter-proposed six percent plus P800.

The union said they have wondered why the bank has refused to improve their wages and benefits “substantially” despite its net income having reportedly tripled for the past three years. From 2005 to 2006, CSB’s net income reportedly grew by 156 percent and its total resources soared to P36 billion in July last year, a whopping 78 percent increase from the July 2006 figures.

Following the CBA deadlock, the CSB management has allegedly cut off the union’s access to communication facilities of the bank to prevent union officers from updating its members regarding developments in the CBA.

The management also allegedly orchestrated a “letter-barrage” to DOLE to make it appear that the employees of the bank want the union to accept the bank’s final offer.

Also yesterday, the union denied the statement of management that the protest rally the other day did not reflect the sentiment of the majority of the members of the CSB-NUBE chapter.

Umali said that about half of the union members at the main branch of CSB had joined the march-rally. More would have reportedly joined if management had not forced the employees to render overtime during their lunch break.

The plight of the employees and the CSB union has reportedly gained the sympathy of unions from other banks in Cebu City.

Around 15 employees of CSB-Colon branch and about 50 more employees from other banks and establishments walked from the Colon branch to the CSB main office at Osmeña Boulevard the other day.

The protesting employees said they have been asking CSB for wage increase, anniversary bonus, gratuity and retirement improvement, five-day workweek with appropriate total working days in a year, and a signing bonus of P15,000.

In a separate statement, Jasmin Oporto of the legal and corporate services of Aboitiz and Company had said that the union officers have refused the financial package offered by the management even if the majority of the union members have been clamoring for them to accept the management’s offer.

Of the total 153 CSB-NUBE members, only 93 reportedly signed the May 16 petition filed before DOLE to call a general assembly and referenda to decide whether the bank’s financial package was acceptable to the majority. —Joeberth M. Ocao/MEEV