By LITO RULONA
Correspondent .
More than 200 casual and job order employees working in Malaybalay City Hall have reportedly been dismissed and removed from their offices by the newly-installed Mayor Florencio Flores.
This was disclosed by Bukidnon Gov. Jose Maria Zubiri during the inaugural session held at the Sangguniang Panlalawigan on Tuesday, saying that those who kicked out have started trooping his office seeking for help.
“This is a very serious problem that happened in the city of Malaybalay. Some them have been with the city government for the past 10 to 15 years in service and then they found themselves since yesterday out of the job,” he said.
He said they are asking the province for help and some of them are asking to be employed at the different offices at the capitol.
He added that the worst scenario is that almost all of them are heads of the family and have children that are currently in school.
“To be honest it bothered me in the whole afternoon. Now I am appealing to the members of the local legislative body to help me in solving this problem. Not of course to the mayor because he does not want the worker. I asked them and then they replied nga gi-suspetsuhan sila nga nag-boto sa kaatbang,” he pointed out.
Zubiri said the mass removal of government workers is the first time that happened in the province of Bukidnon and maybe in the whole country.
“There might be few who were removed from office but they were transferred somewhere else but not with this kind of removal that is in mass. Maybe 10 or 20 but not 200 plus. Even employees who are street sweepers were included in the removal,” he said.
Zubiri said under the local government law, there was so-called personnel limitation and he admitted that if he hired them he would be charged criminally and administratively.
“I am going to Manila on Thursday (July 4) to seek assistance and find out how to solve this mass lay-off of government workers. The removal of a government employees is reportedly on-going because they are targeting more,” he said.
Zubiri cited the move of Lopez as a “big mess” in the political history of Bukidnon.
“Kalouy ba nila (workers). Sige pa sila og pang-sipa karon. I am not a lawyer and I need a lawyer from the local legislative body to dig deeper on the laws if that is possible or not or even allowed by law,” he said.
He said his initial comment from some legal friends that casual and job orders under the government service are that if they were no longer told to work and kicked out from contracts they could do nothing.
“This saddened me tungod sa kadaghan kaayo nga gipangtangtang,” he added.
Disclaimer
Mindanao Gold Star Daily holds the copyrights of all articles and photos in perpetuity. Any unauthorized reproduction in any platform, electronic and hardcopy, shall be liable for copyright infringement under the Intellectual Property Rights Law of the Philippines.
