Duterte urged to stop giving false ‘endo’ hopes

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte should stop giving false hopes to workers that he will end contractualization, more popularly known as endo , meaning end of contract, the scheme of firing workers every six months or less.

Opposition lawmakers Tomasito Villarin of Akbayan party- list and Edcel Lagman of Albay made the call in light of President Duterte’s decision not to sign an Executive Order ( EO) that will ban endo and other unlawful contractualization practices.

Instead, the President asked for more time, specifically a month, for his legal team to review the measure.

“The President is giving our workers false hopes on ending

endo, even floating that an EO will be signed to end endo. An EO cannot go beyond what is stated in the Labor Code, so this EO won’t have the teeth [ to bite away endo],” Villarin said in a news conference.

The House of Representatives approved the bill banning contractualization last January 30.

The bill states that probationary employment should not exceed six months from the date the employee started working.

More important, the House version deletes the Labor Code provision that allows probationary employment under an apprenticeship agreement stipulating a longer period.

The House bill also prohibits hiring employees on fixedterm contracts or definite periods, except in cases of overseas Filipino workers, workers on probation, who are temporary replacements of absent regular employees whose engagement will not exceed six months, project- based employees and seasonal workers.

On top of banning fixed- term employment, the House version prohibits labor- only contracting or a situation wherein the person supplying to an employer does not have substantial capital or investment in the form of tools, equipment, machinery, work premises; has no control over the workers’ methods and means of accomplishing their work; and workers recruited and placed by such persons are performing activities which are directly related to the principal business of such employers.

The bill against endo, however, is yet to progress in the Senate.

“The President’s message [ is that] his allies in the Senate should [ see to] passage of [ this] bill,” Villarin argued.

He took offense at the President’s repeated statements that he will subsidize workers with P500 each to help them cope with rising prices of basic commodities.

“His character shows that he is only making a joke out of his promise to end endo. He should be careful because the workers will end up frustrated and angry at him,” Villarin said.

Lagman argued that the President is just dragging his foot on the matter in favor of his moneyed allies.

“He is procrastinating on his campaign promise in favor of the capitalists and investors,” he said.

During the 2016 campaign, then-Davao City Mayor Duterte said he will end contractualization.