DOLE sends team to settle dispute in Cebu firm

 The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) 7 is sending a four-man team to a furniture export firm in Mandaue City in a move to resolve the ongoing labor dispute that involves the fate of at least 600 workers.  

DOLE 7 Director Elias Cayanong said he has sent the four-man team led by Assistant Director Exequiel Sarcauga to Giardini del Sole Inc., a furniture manufacturing and exporting company in Mandaue City, after workers filed a notice of strike at the National Conciliation and Mediation Board.      

Giardini del Sole, Inc., considered as the country’s biggest furniture manufacturing and exporting company, declared a temporary shutdown after it received zero orders from its international market.

“It’s a terrible crisis (global financial crisis). What can I do? There’s no more order. I have to close down,” said Giardini del Sole owner and president Giovanni Boschi.

Giardini del Sole, established in 1991, exports 90 percent of its products to other countries like the United States, Italy and Norway. But due to the financial crisis, these international clients, especially those in the US, began cutting orders by as much as half.

Still, Giardini continues to produce and sell furniture pieces for the local market that, Boschi noted, made a remarkable performance until last September. He noted that sales have gone down recently as the local market started feeling the pinch of the crisis.

As a result of the closure, more than 400 workers lost their jobs while a few are retained to work on orders of local clients. The affected workers, however, cried foul over the closure as they were not allegedly informed that they will not longer be allowed to work staring last Monday.

Cayanong said DOLE will suggest to the management some alternative measures instead of immediately shutting down the firm, like decreasing the number of working hours or rotating the affected employees so they will still have something for their family’s needs.

“The firm can also give livelihood assistance to affected workers considering that the more than 400 workers have been in the company for several years,” said Cayanong.

The labor director also stressed that DOLE 7 is willing to help the affected employees under the workers’ augmentation program of the government that has P20 million funding from the Office of the President.

He said the workers can be allocated P5,000 worth of livelihood assistance to cope up with the sudden lock down of their work place.

Eunito Sin Jr., vice president of the Nagkahiusang Pwersa nga Mamumuo sa Giardini-Partido ng Manggagawa, said that they filed a notice of strike on Monday before the National Conciliation and Mediation Bureau after they were barred from working on the same day.

But the owner of the firm stressed that the workers were informed last December 23 that “if there are orders, they will work but if there are no orders, they will have no work.” #