PM: ASEAN is anti-labor

Partido Manggagawa has accused the members of the Association of South East Asian Nations of being anti-labor and demanded justice for the workers in the region.

Dennis Derige, spokesperson of PM-Cebu, said the ASEAN is now the fastest growing region in the world in terms of creating economic wealth but the real creators of this wealth, the working class, do not reap the benefits of this growth.

Derige, in a statement, said that during the past 50 years, serious inequality and democracy problems hounded the region with its people plunging under dictatorial regimes one after another with some living under military juntas.

He said that the region is far from being democratic until now and the working class continues to become victim of dictatorship and authoritarianism.

"This is mainly the reason why the trade union movement is one of the weakest in the world. There is in fact one country in ASEAN that has yet to define its labor laws," he said.

The Philippines hosted this year's ASEAN Summit attended by several heads of states.

Derige added that ASEAN is also home to hundreds of export zones where violations of labor rights are rampant. He said that migrant workers, particularly women domestic workers, are into cheap labor and routinely suffer discriminations at work in receiving countries of ASEAN and in other parts of the world.

He said that ASEAN is now home to billionaires who are in the Forbes Magazine's list of richest people in the world, but these billionaires are also subject of several complaints for violating labor standards like security of tenure and freedom of association.

"Many people in the region also do not enjoy universal social protections, thus, were left to live a life of chronic poverty and therefore vulnerable to shocks,” Derige said.

He added that it has been 50 years of sufferings and struggles for the working class of the region.—