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An urgent plea to the management of Lepanto Consolidated
Mining Company: Have mercy on your own workers!

By Regional Ecumenical Council in the Cordilleras (RECCORD)

“So God created man in his image; in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Genesis 1:27

We believe that the human being is created in the image and likeness of God. He/she has inherent rights to life, employment, decent living conditions, services such as food, water, electricity, health and education.

We believe that the striking workers of Lepanto are only asking for a meager amount of wage increases extended over a period of three years, which are 29-peso increase for the first and second year and 33-peso increase for the third year. That this is not only just but is actually a pittance barely enough to cover even the inflation costs of basic commodities. Meanwhile the company gains more than 2 billion pesos annually because of the very workers who produce the gold. Government statistics shows that the workers’ salaries cannot even cope with the daily costs of living.

Whereas the Company claims to lose millions of pesos due to the workers strike, but why does it not give in instead to the demands of the workers which only amounts to P40 million over a period of three years; instead of choosing to make its own workers suffer and lose more than a hundred million pesos in the process?

Whereas during the first ten days of strike, the Company made the workers suffer even more by cutting their water supply, limiting their electricity, hindering their food supply, restraining their medical services, even suspending the shuttle buses of their schoolchildren, serving notices of termination to their leaders, and insulting them as “Igorot na unggoy at patay-gutom.”

Whereas the Department of Labor and Employment has made the Assumption of Jurisdiction and has ordered the workers to return to work or be penalized by law or be violently dispersed by the police, which would even more increase the workers’ sufferings instead of upholding what is just and due to the workers.

Whereas the Lepanto Management can no longer claim that it is on the side of the law for resorting to various illegal acts namely illegal dispersals, illegal arrests and detention, non-recognition of the workers’ permit to rally which was signed by the Mayor himself; union busting; bribery of union leaders, media, local officials, and the police; closing down of a public road which is not under its jurisdiction; ignoring the Benguet Provincial Board’s order for the PNP to maintain themselves 50 meters away; operating without Environmental Compliance Certificate for its Victoria and Teresa gold projects; violation of the Free, Prior, and Informed Consent clause of the Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act (IPRA); libelous red-baiting instead of facing the issues leveled against it squarely; and causing untold environmental destruction to the Abra river and surrounding communities.

We therefore appeal to the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company, the government, the Department of Labor and Employment and all concerned bodies to please value the workers who provide the lifeblood of the company and the nation. They are human beings with rights to live decently and with dignity. Violating the workers’ rights leads to more problems. Violently dispersing the workers does not guarantee peace.

Solution to the problem is profit sharing, reducing a little bit the gap between greed and liberality, between huge profits and hunger. We shall all appear before the Ultimate Judge who can not be bribed nor be lied to. Profiteers wallowing in their wealth should please read the parable of the rich and Lazarus. #

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