By JUSTIN UMALI
Bulatlat.com
CABUYAO CITY, Laguna – Coca-Cola’s Cebu plant is facing backlash from labor groups following an announcement to lay off over 200 contractual workers by February 2025.
Coca-Cola Cebu is set to retrench the workers following the termination of their contract with manpower agency Exeltech Manpower and Services Incorporated. However, the Center for Trade Union and Human Rights (CTUHR) noted that the retrenchment actually comes following an order from the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) to regularize the workers, calling the move a “naked display of corporate greed.”
“Coke’s layoff of its workers is a clear violation of workers’ rights to security of tenure and to unionize and collectively bargain, which are enshrined in the country’s laws,” the labor rights organization said in its statement. “The government should uphold the rights of Coke workers, the country’s laws, and the [Department of Labor and Employment]’s ruling on the workers’ case.”
The affected workers have worked in Coca-Cola Cebu for anywhere from 12 to 17 years. Some of them are unionized under the Progressive Workers Association in Exeltech Manpower and Services Incorporated Coca-Cola Cebu (PWAETMSICCC-IBM-KMU), which has spent years fighting for regularization. In 2019, DOLE ruled in favor of the contractual workers and ordered their regularization; despite this, Coca-Cola Cebu has yet to regularize them.
The company’s retrenchment announcement will affect all members of PWAETMSICC. According to Coca-Cola Cebu, they are set to switch agencies from Exeltech to Xisco.
Alyansa sa mga Mamumuo sa Sugbo (AMA Sugbo-KMU) asserted that Coca-Cola Cebu’s stated reason of switching manpower agencies is a “guise” to dismiss workers. “This move is not only a grave injustice but a clear attempt to remove the existing union and strip workers of their hard-earned victories,” the organization said in its statement. AMA Sugbo is the Cebu regional chapter of labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno.
A troubled history
Since establishing itself in the Philippines in 1981, Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines has had a troubled relationship with its workers. Currently, there are over 500 court cases filed between Coca-Cola Philippines and various petitioners, representing different labor disputes over the years.
Some landmark incidents include the 2013 and 2018 strikes in the Coca-Cola Santa Rosa, Laguna plant, which happened in response to Coca-Cola’s refusal to regularize its workers while interfering with union organizing. The 2018 strike, in particular, happened when Coca-Cola Sta. Rosa refused to regularize 675 contractual workers despite a DOLE order.
The situation is similar in the Cebu plant. Workers have been picketing against the company’s refusal to adhere to DOLE’s decisions and regularize its workers since as early as 2018. Reports from AMA Sugbo and other groups like Alyansa sa Mamumuong Kontrakwal Sugbo (ALSA Kontrakwal Sugbo) however state that these pickets were met by Coca-Cola management with harassment and unfair labor practices.
KMU has repeatedly called out Coca-Cola for its use of labor-only contracting; a form of contractualization whereby workers are recruited and supplied by an agency to work in companies like Coca-Cola. Labor groups like KMU argue that large corporations use labor-only contracting to hide behind manpower agencies and technicalities to protect themselves in labor disputes.
In March 2017, DOLE released Department Order 174, ostensibly to curb labor-only contracting. However, KMU points out that incidents like the mass lay-offs in Coca-Cola Cebu expose the “continuing sore condition of contractual workers.”
“[DO 174] did not end labor-only contracting, and the millions of contractual workers nationwide are still victims of low wages and a lack of job security,” the group said.
CTUHR also stated that DO 174 makes workers “vulnerable to the wholesale violation of their rights” because of its provision mandating the regularization of workers under manpower agencies. “The main employer can simply cite ‘end of contract’ with manpower agencies and retrench workers,” the group said.
Despite Coca-Cola management’s repeated disregard of regularization orders from DOLE, it is at the same time not above cooperating with the government in union matters. Coca-Cola has often cooperated with the police, military, and most recently, the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict to “resolve” labor disputes.
In 2020, during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, state agents from NTF-ELCAC harassed Coca-Cola workers in Sta. Rosa in an attempt to intimidate them against union activity. In one instance, nine workers were directly brought from the plant to the PNP Regional Mobile Force Battalion 4A headquarters in Camp Macario Sakay, Los Baños, Laguna to be presented as New People’s Army “surrenderers.”
More recently, in 2023, workers in Coca-Cola Isabela were forced into signing an agreement with NTF-ELCAC disaffiliating themselves from KMU.
Despite this, AMA Sugbo said that the workers in Coca-Cola Cebu remain committed to fighting for “regularization, fair wages, and an end to union-busting practices.” The group is also calling on all workers to “stand in solidarity with Coca-Cola workers in their fight for job security and regularization, living wages, decent work conditions, and respect for their right to unionize.” (RVO)