Various federations and central unions of government employees again trooped to the Senate in Pasay City last APril 29 to demand the Marcos regime to increase their salaries and other benefits. They first held a forum to discuss raising wages to living standards and the current state of employees. After this, they staged a picket in front of the Senate which was immediately blocked by the security forces.

The Confederation for Unity, Recognition, and Advancement of Government Employees (Courage), Alliance of Health Workers (AHW), Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), Kawani Laban sa Kontraktwalisasyon (KALAKON), Public Service Labor Independent Confederation (PSLINK), Philippine Independent Public Sector Employees Association (PIPSEA), Kapisanan ng mga Manggagawa sa GOCCs at GFIs Inc. (KAMAGGFI), and Public Workers Congress (PUBLIK) participated in the protest.

“In the public sector, the basic salary starts at ₱13,000 per month in national agencies, and ₱8,450 for those in local government units in a sixth class municipality,” Santiago Dasmariñas Jr, national president of Courage, shared in the forum.

Thus, employees demand that the Marcos regime pass a new salary standardization law that sets minimum wage to ₱33,000 a month. This should apply to all employees, whether in the national agency or the local government.

Apart from this, employees also pushed for the repeal of the contractualization policy among government employees. As of June 2023, there are at least 830,000 or 29.68% of the total government employees under job order and contract-of-service arrangements.